


Three Weeks Outside Time

by Thistlerose



Series: Midnight Conversations [8]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Blackcest, Coming Out, M/M, Marauders' Era, Sexual Content, Underage Drinking, Underage Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-09
Updated: 2013-05-09
Packaged: 2017-12-10 21:52:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 24,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/790580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thistlerose/pseuds/Thistlerose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written in 2004.  While spending the last few weeks of summer at the Lupins' house in Scotland, Sirius begins to see his friend - and himself - in a new light.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Additional warning WITH SPOILERS: In Chapter Six, Sirius describes a sexual encounter with his cousin Bellatrix, which took place when he was thirteen. Consent is highly dubious. Sirius's description of the event is vague, but if you want to skip over it, it starts with the line: "I've been doing it for three," and ends with "That would put me off women too."

Before they’d gone out, Sylvie Lupin had drawn him aside and said to him in a hushed voice not meant to be overheard, “Thank you, Sirius, for everything you’ve done for my son. You and James and Peter. His father and I were so worried when we put him on the train five years ago, but each summer he’s come back to us looking so happy--and healthy. His transformations have gotten easier, I think,” Remus’ mother had gone on, her large dark eyes--uncomfortably like her son’s--filling with tears. “I don’t know what the three of you have been doing, but I think it’s more than Nick or I have ever been able to do. I love Remus so much,” she’d whispered, and the tears had begun to spill down her cheeks, embarrassing both of them. “We both do. Nick and I. But we--” She’d noticed his discomfort then, finally, smiled ruefully, and finished, “--so, thank you. So much.” Then she’d kissed his cheek--which had also felt strange because her lips were so like Remus’--and sent him on his way.

He hadn’t told Remus about that scene. When he’d asked what his mother had wanted with him, Sirius had replied with a smirk, “What do _all_ women want from me?” and earned himself a dunk in the river. He’d managed not to think about it all during their hike, their swim, and their unfortunate attempt at making supper. Now as the night wore on and he found himself unable to sleep, Mrs Lupin’s words came back to him and refused to be shunted away again.

Rubbish, all of it, he decided after minimal reflection. She made him and James and Peter sound like bleeding hearts, and Remus like a charity case. What had she and her husband imagined they’d do when they realised their roommate was a werewolf? She couldn’t know about Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs. Remus wouldn’t have told her. So, what did she suppose they did, send him flowers once a month? Remus was a decent bloke. Better than decent. It was too bad he’d been dealt such a rotten hand; the least his mates could do was make it fun for him, as best they could. Nothing they could do about the painful transformations, unfortunately, but they could keep him company, try to keep him from tearing himself to pieces in the absence of human prey. Besides, he liked being Padfoot, and it had been great fun going under everyone’s noses researching and then performing the difficult Animagus spell. The risk was what made it fun and the fact that Remus would benefit what made it the right thing to do.

Satisfied for the moment, Sirius reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a mashed pack of cigarettes. Remus didn’t smoke, but Remus was asleep and not about to complain if he had a fag or two out in the open air. He inhaled deeply and let the smoke out slowly, lifting his eyes to watch the pale curtain rise and fade against the sky. 

It was a lovely night. He never got to see stars like this in London; until his first camping trip at Hogwarts he’d never even realised what he was missing. Remus might be less keen on the view, though, he reflected as his gaze flicked to the waxing moon, hanging like a great toothy grin against the glittering backdrop. It would be full in four nights.

“Don’t you mess with my mate,” he said darkly as he snuffed his cigarette against the dirt. “We’re onto you. I seriously doubt anyone’s going to miss you. Overrated things, tides.”

The sound of his voice and the fact that the object he addressed was thousands of miles away, made him lonely. He hated being the last one to fall asleep, always had. He considered rousing Moony, but decided against it; Remus had gotten himself pissed enough on the whisky they’d nicked to make waking him not worth the effort. Sirius had consumed as much, if not more, but instead of knocking him out, the alcohol made him jumpy, restless. He felt it in his blood, a trickle of fire dripping into his heart.

He wanted to be up and running. Instead he found himself watching Remus as he inhaled and exhaled deeply, the thin lips half-parted, the dishevelled light-brown head resting heavily on limp, delicate wrists. Moonlight spilled down onto his exposed neck, and for some reason this made something inside Sirius burn with more than the firewhisky. He crawled forward, over the dirt, on his elbows and placed himself between the sleeping boy and the moonbeam.

Fuck it, he thought, he couldn’t blow up the moon. _This_ pointless little act was all he could manage. He couldn’t save Remus, could only try to interpose himself between him and danger. Sylvie Lupin didn’t know what she was talking about.

Anyway, if anything, Remus had saved _him_ this summer, by inviting him to spend August with him in Scotland instead of at his family’s house in London, where he’d no doubt have stifled by now. His usual saviour, James, was off in Tasmania, the lucky ponce; he’d rather chew off his own leg than spend more than two days with Peter, however nice Mrs Pettigrew was to him; and for some reason he and his girlfriend Catriona were having problems. Again.

He’d gone to Cat first, actually, when his own parents had begun to drive him mental. He hadn’t seen her since the end of June and though he hadn’t exactly been missing her he’d almost been able to convince himself for a day or two that it was good to be with her again. Her parents had been away, which had been fortunate because he hadn’t felt up to skulking around, after having spent most of July doing just that in his own house. So, they hadn’t skulked. They hadn’t talked much, either. They’d done a lot of clubbing, a lot of drinking, and a lot of fucking. And bloody awful it had been. Stupid Cat, he thought. Or maybe he was the stupid one, thinking he could lose himself in her when he hadn’t been able to lose himself in any other girl.

She’d put a stop to it, finally, and a good thing she had because he doubted he’d have had the strength to do it. He’d been jack-knifing into her one sweltering night and she’d said as calmly as though they’d been sharing afternoon tea, “Just finish, Black, and get off me. Then get out. This isn’t working.” Beautiful Cat. Really, really beautiful Cat, with her clear grey eyes, her cascade of strawberry-blond hair, her long white limbs, and her perfect pink nipples. She’d really been tossing him out. Beautiful Cat. And he, idiotically, had told her she was wrong, that it _was_ working, even as he lost his erection and slumped on top of her, frustrated, confused, and nauseated--by her, himself, the other girls who’d been just as beautiful and just as wrong, his parents, James for being away--

He’d left for Melrose and Remus the next morning. He knew Cat assumed he’d go back when he’d had some time to sort himself out, and he supposed he would, but he doubted their relationship would last into September. He wasn’t terribly put out by it, just annoyed that he’d have to start again with someone else.

Thank everything good and righteous for Remus, he thought, sucking on another cigarette and blowing the smoke away from the sleeping boy. Remus hadn’t demanded anything of him, and his parents, Nicholas and Sylvie, were all right. More than all right. This camping trip had been their idea, and a good idea it had been. After the pounding noise of the clubs, the alcohol and the smoke and the sex, Sirius knew he needed a day or two of fresh air. And Remus was soothing company. Very soothing.

He smoked until the cigarette had burnt down to an inch; then he smothered it and turned back to his friend.

He looked peaceful, blanketed by Sirius’ shadow. Peaceful and--beautiful. The observation sent a little spark through Sirius’ body, but he shook himself and, No, he thought, Remus wasn’t _beautiful_ \--not the way Cat and all her predecessors had been. There was something beautiful _about_ him, though. Wondering why he hadn’t realised until now just how pissed he was, Sirius continued to study Remus with a diligence he’d never applied to any of his subjects at school. 

There were the brushstroke-fine eyebrows, arched frankly even in sleep over the short, downswept lashes. The eyes he already knew about. They were brown, the most ordinary colour in the world. Or maybe not so ordinary, he reflected, considering how they stood out against the pale face, or considering the solemnity, intelligence, and penchant for mischief that lay behind them. He was skinny, Sirius thought desperately, as his heart began to flounder against his ribcage. He had a long nose, a pointy chin, and he had big ears. 

A breeze, cool and heather-laced, stirred his hair, gently as a caress. It did not touch Remus because of Sirius crouched over him and that struck Sirius as a gross injustice. Without thinking, he reached out and brushed a few errant strands back from Remus’ smooth brow.

Remus sighed and his mouth settled into the smallest of smiles.

The universe paused as though holding its breath, and when it resumed less than a second later, only Sirius knew that everything had changed.

_No_ , he thought as he pushed himself away from Remus and stumbled to his feet, nearly tripping over his blankets in his haste to free himself. That was no answer. What the hell kind of answer was that? Answers were supposed to solve problems, not complicated ones that already existed.

He stood over Remus, breathing heavily and as vast as the world seemed for some reason there was not enough air in it to fill his lungs. _No_ , he thought for the third and last time that night. He _had_ to be somewhere else then, had to start moving and not stop until things went back to the way they were supposed to be. He transformed and took off across the low, rolling hills, swift as a thought and light as the moon’s glow on water.

He ran through the heather, scattering blossoms like raindrops and raising a scent that somehow did not smother that of the one he’d left sleeping. He leaped over streams, over rocks, over low stone fences and fallen trees. He scared pheasants into the air and got thistles caught in his ruff and tail. He ran, and as he did the horizon seemed to stretch and strain away from him and when he paused finally, his chest heaving, at the crest of a hill, he realised what he was doing was pointless. He was no farther from Remus than he’d been at his side. 

For years he’d been struggling, drowning in the skin of a person he could not be. For years. And here was shore, rocky and perhaps bleak, but shore. He’d asked for an answer and received it. He’d said no three times tonight, uselessly.

Maybe it was time for a yes.

He trotted back to the campsite, slowly, and to his surprise, found Remus awake there, his arms folded under his chin, his beautiful eyes scanning the darkness. The light in them when they glanced upon the dog was unmistakeable.

“Where did you go?” the boy asked as the dog approached. “Chasing conies? Come here. What’s this in your hair? Thistles,” he observed, untangling one and wrinkling his nose at it. “ _Very_ becoming, Padfoot.”

The dog lowered his head and whined, but the slender hands continued to pluck thoughtlessly at his ruff. If he tried to back away, his legs would give out, they were trembling so violently. Remus noticed and asked him, concern and confusion in his tone, how far he’d gone.

How far had he gone? The dog did not know. He hadn’t been aware of distance or time. He tried to think of them now, but the definitions seemed to have altered while he hadn’t been paying attention. Where once there’d been something more abstract now there was _near_ this person and _away from_ this person. There was _with,_ this person and _without_ this person, and the latter, the dog knew, was utterly intolerable.

“Change back,” Remus entreated, and he wanted to, because as good as those hands felt on his hair, he knew they would feel even better on his skin. 

But he didn’t change. He couldn’t change. Remus was only touching him because that was what one did with a dog. If he wanted to be touched--and he did, oh he did--he had to stay in this form. If he changed back, Remus would know. Somehow, something about Sirius--a change in his voice, his heartbeat, his eyes--would give him away, and Remus would know, and Remus _couldn’t_ know. Not yet. Maybe not ever. 

The dog whined again in frustration, and beat the earth with his tail. 

“All right,” said Remus, “I guess you’re not going to tell me. I’ll take that to mean no Quintapeds are bearing down on our campsite.” He yawned. “I’m bloody knackered. Go to sleep, Padfoot.” 

Remus withdrew his hands and the dog nearly let loose a howl of despair. Remus frowned up at him, his big dark eyes clouded with fatigue and bewilderment. “What is it?” he asked again. “Are you all right? Are you hurt?” 

The dog tossed his head dismissively and sank to his haunches. 

“Not hurt?” 

Snort. 

“All right?" 

Huff. 

“All right.” This time it wasn’t a question. Remus lay on his back, one hand behind his head, the other resting on his belly, and smiled at the dog, who at that moment wanted nothing more than to curl up at his side and bask in his nearness and warmth. 

He had to content himself with keeping guard, and Remus seemed to understand that. “Well,” he said, “you’re completely mental, but I feel very safe.” He gave the dog’s ruff one last affectionate tug. Then he dropped his hand back against his belly, and closed his eyes. 

The dog watched him. He watched until his breathing evened out and the rise and fall of his chest became a steady rhythm. He watched until the moon had completed its arc across the sky and sank below the distant hills. That threat passed, he settled down to sleep, but found he had to keep watching because dawn was beginning to flutter in the east, the stars were beginning to fade, and soon the sun would rise and the dog wanted to be awake when its first rays tangled in the sleeping boy’s lashes and warmed his pale cheeks. 

Gradually, as the sky lightened, the sounds and smells of night receded and before long were gone altogether, except in the dog’s memory. He became aware of damp earth and grass, of birds coming awake, of running water and a breeze sighing through the gorse bushes. 

Remus stirred, startling the dog. He was running out of time, he realised. Once Remus woke, he would have to change back, and then there would have to be explanations. 

He did not waste time. Taking great care not to disturb the boy, not even to let his shadow fall across him, he leaned close and touched his wet nose lightly to one smooth cheek. Remus’ lashes twitched and the dog withdrew, holding the boy’s scent--the best scent in the world, surely--in his lungs. He held it until he no longer could and when he released it, at last, he felt another shiver of despair writhe through his body. 

It was stupid. Even as a dog, he knew it was stupid. It couldn’t possibly come to anything. Remus was straight. It didn’t matter. None of it mattered. All he had--all he would ever have, in all likelihood--was this fancy, and this kiss that wasn't quite a kiss. 

He was too tired to think anymore. He put his head between his paws and went to sleep. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: (SPOILER) This chapter contains a brief, but explicit fantasy about rimming. If that's not your thing (it's about the only explicit sex happening in this story) you can safely scroll down to "The fantasy shattered."

Remus kissed him once behind each ear. Then he parted his hair and pressed a kiss into the hollow at the base of his skull. From there he moved downward, planting kisses along his neck, on his shoulders, and down his spine. Sirius was hard. In fact, lying prone was becoming increasingly uncomfortable. But he was reluctant to roll over. It wasn’t because he still felt strange revealing himself entirely to Remus, revealing his want, his need. Remus wanted _him_. That was why he was kissing him, why his hands were on his waist…and now on his arse, kneading the firm flesh. Oh, Merlin… No, that wasn’t it. It was just… This was nice. Just lying…like this. He was calm. Safe. Warm. He would roll over eventually, when Remus was ready for him to roll over. It could wait, though. He could deal with the discomfort while Remus dealt with his back.

Remus cupped his arse cheeks and squeezed, making him moan. Merlin, those fingers. They were so pretty to look at, he should have guessed they’d be so…skilled. One traced his cleft, and that was nice, too. Tantalising. Not too foreign. One of his girlfriends--Maddin--had had a penchant for pinching his arse. He hadn’t minded. He dismissed Mads quickly, because there was only room for two in the bed, and Remus’ thumbs had nudged their way between his thighs and were beginning to pry them apart. Sirius let them, although that _did_ feel a little strange. 

“You could help me, Padfoot,” Remus said, a chuckle in his tone. “Come on, I’m not going to hurt you.”

No, Remus never would. So Sirius spread his legs, and raised himself slightly off the mattress to accommodate his erection. 

Remus knelt between his legs. Sirius felt his warmth on the back of his thighs, and shivered. He couldn’t help it, hoped Remus would not notice. This was nice. More than nice, really. It simply wasn’t what he was used to.

He yelped in surprise when Remus’ tongue flicked out and touched the inside of his thigh. The tongue withdrew at once, and he clutched the sheets and swallowed. All right, he told himself, all right. You’ve been licked and blown a fair few times. It’s only a tongue. Think of where _yours_ has been. It’s just no one else’s tongue has ever come at you from that angle, is all. “Sorry,” he muttered.

“No, don’t apologise.” 

Remus was so fucking polite, even when he was fucking Sirius.

“It’s all right.”

“We can stop…”

“No, I want you. I want this.”

“Fine.” This last was a whisper against his skin. A moment later he felt the tongue again, a slow swipe behind his knee ( _very_ nice) gliding slowly upward (nicer…). It reached his cleft again, and Sirius waited, but instead of doing what he’d thought he was going to do, Remus moved to his other leg and followed a mirroring trail. 

“How’s this?”

“Nice.”

“Just nice?”

“Very nice.”

“Are you nervous?”

“No. Yes. It’s all right. I want you.”

But he closed his eyes when Remus spread him further with his hands and the tip of his tongue touched Sirius' opening, and he shuddered violently when Remus' hand wrapped itself around his cock. Maybe his reaction was normal. Remus probed a little deeper, and it _felt_ nice, just… _different_. A little deeper still…the fingers played lightly over the head of his cock…a little deeper…

And _that_ was too much. He dropped his head heavily and shook it. “Can’t,” he muttered. “Moony, I-- Please.”

Remus pulled back and released his cock, leaving Sirius feeling oddly bereft. “Merlin, Padfoot,” he said exasperatedly, “if you can’t even imagine it, how the fuck are you going to do it in real life?”

 

The fantasy shattered. Sirius opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. Merlin, what the fuck was he doing? A week ago, it had been Catriona he’d ravish in his mind. Really. And he’d gotten off on those images. Usually. Long white legs wrapped around his waist, small soft breasts in his mouth, long nails dragging across his back… Who in hell _couldn’t_ get off on that image? That had been a week ago. Two days ago the fantasy still began with him pounding into Cat, but by the time he came it was clear someone had supplanted her--someone with short brown hair and brown eyes and a considerably flatter chest. Someone with a _cock_.

That had been two days ago. _Now_ his fantasies usually began with him kissing Remus--yes, Remus, Catriona had vacated the premises officially--but they almost invariably ended with the tables turned and Remus ravishing _him_.

Not at all an unpleasant image, but considering he’d only just come to realise he fancied his (male) friend, it was a little overwhelming.

He was hard, now. Painfully so. Listening first to make sure Remus was still sleeping (he was) he slicked one hand with his tongue, then slipped it under his duvet and into his pants. _That_ was nice. He bent his knees and thrust into his fist, biting back a cry as he did. Nicer when he pretended it was Remus’ hand on his cock, or better still, his mouth…

A groan escaped his lips. He couldn’t help it. Flushing helplessly, he could only force himself still, and wait. Sure enough--

“Padfoot?” Remus mumbled sleepily from his own bed. “All right?”

He didn’t trust his voice, but if he didn’t say anything, Remus would think he was having nightmares and come over to try and wake him. “Mmmff,” he replied unintelligibly. Remus did not answer back, and after a few agonising moments, Sirius expelled a relieved breath. Not that Remus catching him wanking off would have been so very tragic, he reflected. There wasn’t much Remus didn’t know about his various sexual adventures, and they’d both been subjected to the sound of James groaning Lily’s name behind his own closed bed curtains back in Gryffindor. Merlin, Remus even knew about his disastrous first time, although he didn’t know who it had been, or why. 

The memory took some of the edge off his ardour. He didn’t soften, but at least his need for release diminished somewhat. He kept his hand on himself, but he lowered his legs, and his thrusts this time were shallower, slower. 

It occurred to him in time that it would be very poor manners to come on a borrowed duvet. That, and he wanted a fag. So, with a grunt, he sat up, swung out of bed, and went to the loo, grabbing his cigarettes from his jeans’ pocket on his way and sparing no glance for Remus, once more curled up and soundly asleep. 

Once inside, he closed the door and locked it. Then he opened the window, stuck a cigarette between his lips, pulled down his pants, and sat on the toilet. 

It had been more comfortable when he’d been supine, but he could manage this way, too. He just closed his eyes and pictured Remus kneeling between his legs. His hand was a mean substitute for Remus' mouth--or anyone’s mouth, he tried halfheartedly to tell himself--but it worked. He came, finally, and slumped, panting, against the wall.

When the stars faded and the room stopped heaving, he opened his eyes and stared glassily out the window. The sky was grey. It would rain, soon, and probably all day. Fucking Scotland. At least it had stayed nice for most of their camping trip.

It had been nice, that trip. Very nice. Remus was no athlete, but he was no wimp, either. They’d hiked over the Eildon Hills, gone swimming in the River Teviot, visited the Border Abbeys of Dryburgh and Jedburgh. The hills had been more to his liking, but he’d been able to appreciate the Muggle ruins, probably because Remus had been so bloody keen to show them off to him. They’d spent a night in the Galloway Forest Park, and there Sirius had had his epiphany. 

He wondered, not for the first time, as he sucked at his cigarette, if he’d be in this position now, had he simply gone to sleep that night and not spent it gazing at Remus and thinking about the moon. He was for it now, no question. He doubted he’d be able to keep this a secret for long. Not that he fancied Remus, but that he no longer fancied girls. He’d have to break things off with Cat, and he’d have to tell James _something_ because the bugger would wonder, when he showed up for the train completely Cat-less, why he’d found no replacement. He couldn’t lie. Well…he supposed he could, but he didn’t want to. Not to James.

Could he lie to Remus, he wondered? He didn’t want to do that, either, although he could hardly tell him how he really felt. Remus would think he was putting him on. At the very least. At worst…

Actually, now that he thought about it, Remus might understand. Perhaps not the bit about Sirius fancying boys and certainly not the bit about Sirius fancying _him_ , but he might understand the bit about Sirius being different, now, from most other blokes. Not that a werewolf would know necessarily what it was like to be a poof any more than a poof could know what it was like to be a werewolf. But in their society, both their afflictions--Merlin, was that really what it was?-- relegated them to the outskirts of things. Really, Remus was the perfect confidant. There was no question he’d be discreet. It was so perfect it was nearly farcical, and Sirius had to laugh, bitterly. 

He broke off when someone knocked on the bathroom door, and he jumped up quickly and dropped his cigarette butt into the toilet when Remus said, “Padfoot? Are you almost done in there?”

“Almost,” Sirius shouted over the flush. “About to take a shower. Why? D’you need to…?” _…take one, too? I think there’s room for two, here… Merlin, this is fucked up._

“Nah, I’ll use the one downstairs,” Remus said. “Mum’s making coffee. Dad’s making you a traditional Scottish breakfast. Which,” he added bemusedly, “is about the same as a traditional English breakfast, only worse, probably. And I think he’s planning on making you cock-a-leekie soup for lunch.”

Sirius choked.

“I know,” Remus went on, merrily oblivious, “that was my reaction, too. At least it’s not haggis. Dad’s a good cook, anyway, but… If he wants to turn you into a Scot he’s going about it all wrong. I don’t think anyone ever moved here on account of the food.”

“It’s all them fine young men in skirts,” Sirius said, and then wished with all his heart that he had not.

“Kilts,” Remus reminded him. “Call it a skirt in front of Dad and you’ll be back on the Knight Bus in seconds. He thinks I ought to get one. You know, for social functions. Can you see me in a kilt?”

Quite the little sadist, his wolf. How had Sirius missed, for so long, this streak of absolute evil?

“Anyway,” said Remus, “I’ll meet you downstairs. If things get too Scottish for you, there’s a curry place in town that I think you’ll like. It’ll be raining sideways by noon, but I don’t mind getting wet if you don’t.”

And with that charming image, he left, and Sirius had to clutch at the sink in order to remain upright. Bugger, he thought. Bugger, bugger. He would never make it to next week, let alone September.


	3. Chapter 3

Remus was absolutely arse at cards, a fact Sirius usually found uproarious, if a little tedious, since it meant he had to pretend not to be losing on purpose a quarter of the time. Today, however, he did not mind in the slightest. He’d have been perfectly happy to slip twos and threes up his sleeves all afternoon if it had meant he could spend the time watching Remus’ beautiful hands and fingers. Shuffling and dealing. Fanning his cards. Drumming the table lightly while he waited for Sirius to make his move. Stroking his chin or tugging at a lock of hair while he contemplated his own. He asked Sirius a few times if he was bored and wanted to do something else, but Sirius always shook his head and pointed to the window, outside of which the rain was, as Remus had predicted earlier, falling sideways.

At any rate, he had no desire to get up. The Lupins had a pleasant living room, if a small one, and on a cold, rainy day it was particularly cosy. _Quaint_ , his mother would probably have pronounced it, her nose in the air, if she’d bothered to cross the threshold at all. In all likelihood, she would not have, and that made Sirius like it all the more. The couch and chairs were obviously old and quite worn, but they were comfortable. The rug was a little threadbare, but still managed to cover a good portion of the wood floor. There were pictures on the walls, mostly photographs of Remus and his parents, though there were some of people Sirius did not recognise. They looked like nice people, though. He assumed they were Sylvie Lupin’s French relatives, since most of them had large intelligent brown eyes, and thin, gently smiling lips. 

Sylvie herself was curled up in a patched and overstuffed armchair by the fireplace, a blanket of green and blue tartan (the Lupins had distant ties to the Henderson clan) draped loosely about her shoulders. She seemed engrossed in a copy of _La Presse Magique_ , though every now and then one slender hand (like Remus’, Sirius tried not to think) would extend and stroke the tawny fur of the plump cat Merry, who sprawled beside her. 

Remus’ father, Nicholas, was in the kitchen, making good his cock-a-leekie threat. The smells wafting into the living room were pleasant enough.

“Dad’s not a bad cook,” Remus said when, looking up from his cards, he caught Sirius sniffing the air in a very Padfoot-like manner. 

“Can’t be, can he?” said Sirius, grinning. “He’s got a Frenchwoman to impress.”

Mrs Lupin gave a delicate snort, but did not glance up from her newspaper.

“And I’ve got an Englishman to conquer,” Remus said. “Sassenach.”

“You watch your tongue, mate,” said Sirius, hoping his lofty tone would distract Remus from his sudden flush. “I might stop letting you win.”

“Oh, is that what you’ve been doing?”

“Not at all,” Sirius said and glanced down at his deliberately pitiful hand. “What’s in cock-a-leekie soup, anyway?” he asked as he pretended to study his cards.

“What do you think?”

“You know what I think. I just can’t say it in front of your mum.”

“Well, if you can’t say it, I certainly can’t.”

“There aren’t any cocks in cock-a-leekie soup,” Sylvie Lupin declared, and with a loud sigh, turned her page.

“I love your mum,” Sirius muttered, and grinned again at Remus, who was avoiding his eyes and swiftly turning scarlet. “Both your parents.”

“You would,” he mumbled, so low his mother could not possibly have overheard. “They’re bloody nice to you.”

“Pretty damn nice to you, too, they are,” Sirius whispered back, over his cards. “That’s one of the reasons I like them. I like people who are nice to my Moony.” _My_ Moony. He’d dared to say it. But of course Remus took no notice. He was scowling down at his own cards, his brows drawn together. Sirius found himself staring at the little worried crease between them and addressing it, instead of trying to capture Remus’ gaze: “Compare them to my parents, anyway. You’ve never met them, but I’ve told you enough horror stories, haven’t I? You think my mum would say a word like ‘cock’? You think she even knows that word? My mum and dad had sex exactly three times, I’ve come to realise. You’re sitting opposite the result of their second go.”

“Shh,” Remus pleaded. “We can talk about it later.”

In the kitchen, Nicholas Lupin was singing along with the Muggle LP:

_“I will build my love a bower_  
By yon clear and crystal fountain,  
And on it I will pile  
All the flowers of the mountain.” 

As Sirius watched, the little crease between Remus’ fine eyebrows deepened, and his thin shoulders hunched ever so slightly. Confused, he glanced over at Sylvie and discovered that her aspect had changed as well. She was no longer focussed intently on her newspaper, but gazing into the fireplace, her large dark eyes full of the leaping flames and--it seemed to Sirius--rather over-bright. He turned back to Remus and found his friend gazing at him, the rueful smile on his lips at distinct odds with the solemnity in his eyes.

“What?” Sirius whispered. “Is it because the full moon’s tomorrow night?”

Remus opened his mouth slightly, but then shook his head and said nothing.

Mr Lupin sang:

_“If my true love, she should leave me,  
I will never find another…”_

“We’ll go for that curry, later,” Sirius said lightly. “I’ll need to wash all this bloody Scottishness out of my system.”

Remus was trying hard to frown. Sirius could tell. But the effort was in vain and it wasn’t long before his smile was widening. Wanly, still, but it was something. “Come on, then,” Sirius said, “let’s see your hand.”

Remus sighed and with a small shrug, laid his cards face-up on the table. “Three of a kind.”

“Well,” said Sirius, then pretended to drop his cards into his lap and as he retrieved them, he surreptitiously exchanged an extremely handsome jack of hearts for the two of clubs he’d been keeping up his sleeve for just such a moment. “Bugger, that’s better than what I have.”

 

“Your folks are brilliant,” Sirius said as, a few hours later, they made their way--slowly and muddily--up the road that led into town. Before they’d left the house, Mr Lupin had cast an Impervius charm on them, though the rain had tapered off somewhat, shortly after lunch. It was really only drizzling, now: a grey, cold, misty, distinctly Scottish drizzle that Sirius found more irritating than the afternoon’s downpour. Mr Lupin had promised him before he and Remus had left the house, that it would clear up completely by nightfall. And then there would be hail.

“They’re all right,” Remus hedged. He had his hands in his jacket pockets, and his face was down. It was how he walked, normally, but for some reason it bothered Sirius a bit more today than it did usually.

“They’re crazy about you. How about all them pictures they have hanging up of you? You were a cute baby. Plump, but cute. Funny, you’d told me you were plump, but I didn’t believe you.”

“Look,” said Remus shortly, “don’t. I mean, don’t be jealous of me.”

“Why the bloody hell not? D’you think I was kidding when I said my folks only shagged three times? They don’t even share a bed. D’you know how many pictures there are of me back in Grimmauld Place? Grand total of one. And I have reason to believe my mum uses it for target practice when I’m off at school. Your parents love you. You’re a bloody werewolf, and they love you. I’m a Gryffindor, and my parents hate me. Doesn’t bother me, much. I’m glad you have great parents. I just wish mine were a bit like yours. This way?”

They’d reached a crossroads. Remus jerked his shoulder the other way and they continued in that direction. Presently they came to the crest of a hill. Looking down through the shivering mist they could just make out, up ahead in the distance, the lights of the town of Melrose. 

“Pain in the arse living so far out of town?” Sirius asked as they descended--cautiously, because the mud was thick and slippery.

“Sometimes,” Remus replied. “When I was younger, of course, it used to seem like a long journey, just going for ice cream. But it’s not that far, really. Guess I’ll be happy when I can Apparate.”

“Yeah,” Sirius agreed. “I’ll be glad when I don’t have to use the tube to get places in London. Bloody bother. You’re right, though. This walk isn’t so bad. Would be nicer if it weren’t raining, but… Fucking Scotland,” he pronounced cheerfully. “Did you really have to walk the whole way, just to go to the grocer’s and stuff?”

“Really,” said Remus. “We couldn’t fly because people would see us. We actually had a car for a while, but Mum was the only one who ever drove it. Dad didn’t even like riding in it with her. Felt too confining, he said. Anyway, he liked to walk. Likes. Still likes.”

“Which do you prefer?”

“Both, I guess. It was nice to have the car when it rained, or when it was hot. The top rolled back. Mum and I used to get to town with our hair a mess. She’d fix it with a spell when no one was looking. I used to think it was brilliant. Driving, I mean. With the top down. I used to think it was a bit like flying. Except better, because the car had a radio and Mum used to blast her favourite Muggle songs. She loved Elvis. And Simon and Garfunkel. And the Beatles.”

Sirius had heard of the Beatles, because Lily Evans had a passion for them, and James had a passion for Lily. The other three were completely unfamiliar. “I’ve seen cars,” he said. “Lots of ‘em. You can’t convince me one is better than a broomstick. Even something like a Swiftstick.”

“I was never on a broomstick before I was ten,” Remus reminded him. “I didn’t know. I agree with you, now. Except about the music.”

“I notice no one volunteered to drive us into town.”

“Very perceptive, Padfoot.” Remus’ voice had changed. A few moments ago, he’d sounded as though he wanted to talk at all. Now there was amusement in his tone, even a little mischief. “You either _didn’t_ notice I talked about the car in the past tense, or forgot it.”

“What happened to the car?”

Remus was silent.

Sirius waited, but the silence only lengthened. Finally, “What happened to the car?” he asked again, and stole a glance at Remus.

Remus bit his lip and ducked his head quickly, but even through the mist and drizzle Sirius caught the bright flush and the way the brown eyes gleamed. “Crashed it,” Remus said, finally.

“Who crashed it?”

“Me.” He lifted his head and looked at Sirius. “Don’t stare at me like that, Padfoot. Don’t tell me you never crashed a broomstick.”

“A _broomstick_ , Moony. A car is--” He’d seen countless cars in London. Big, clunky, foul-smelling things, that screeched when they came to a sudden halt. He’d seen phone booths that cars had struck. He’d seen squirrels and cats that had been hit. He knew Muggles were killed by them all the time. “You crashed the car,” he said stupidly.

“I crashed the car,” Remus agreed. “I was nine, and I don’t remember why, but my parents had gone out, and I really, desperately wanted to get to town. I must’ve wanted to impress them. Show them I could look after myself. They were pretty protective. Still are, I guess. Anyway, I had this bloody awful idea to drive into town, buy some fresh groceries, and make them a fancy dinner. Merlin knows what I intended. I could cook when I was nine. I used to watch Dad whenever he made something. We’d read the recipe together and he’d send me after ingredients, so I knew what everything was. It felt like doing magic. Anyway, no one told me you had to be a certain age in order to drive legally. I think my parents always assumed I’d never need to drive. I did think it was a bit of a bad sign when my feet couldn’t reach the pedals. But I tied books to my trainers, and it worked well enough. I’d watched my mother often enough. I knew _how_ to drive. I’m sure I thought it out very carefully. I just didn’t know how to handle a car. Got pretty far, though, considering.”

“Until you crashed,” said Sirius, knowing he ought to be proud of his Moony for executing so spectacularly disastrous a piece of mischief, but fascinated and horrified, despite the fact that Remus was obviously hale and whole, and walking beside him. 

“Until I crashed,” said Remus. “There’s a roundabout a little ways up. We’ll get to it. I used to think they were fun, when I was driving with Mum. I realised when I got there, though, that I had no idea which way to turn. There was this other car approaching and I thought I knew which way he’d go, so I went-- Only, of course he didn’t go the way I thought he would. We didn’t hit each other. I just--slammed my foot on the brakes and I went spinning. You’ll see, there’s a big maple tree that grows by the roundabout. There’s a big chunk of bark missing.”

“Were you _hurt_?” He was trying--and failing--to picture nine-year-old Remus--all big dark eyes and fragile limbs--in a Muggle car, wrapped around a tree.

“Of course,” Remus said, as though Sirius had asked him he’d done his homework for the weekend. “I sprained my neck, broke my wrist. I had so many bruises it hurt to do _anything_ for a week. Mum and Dad were furious. More about me than about the car. I mean, of course they were angrier that I’d hurt myself than that I’d destroyed the car. This is going to sound mental, Padfoot, but I think somehow I wanted them to be angrier about the car. It was a Ferrari.”

“My parents would’ve given me a thrashing if I’d done anything like that,” Sirius said. “If we’d had a car. I probably would’ve wrecked it, too. They’d’ve thrashed me for wrecking the car, and for failing to get myself killed.”

Frowning again, Remus said, “The thing is, when I said they were angry about me--that’s what I meant. They were angry _about_ me, not-- _at_ me. I sensed it, then, but I didn’t really understand it until I was older. They expected me to be hurt. I mean, I don’t think they ever thought I’d take the car, but I don’t think they ever thought I could do something without there being--pain involved. I suppose. I don’t know if I’m explaining it well. It didn’t seem to shock them, that I would almost get myself killed. Does that make sense?”

It did, but Sirius did not know what to say. He was aware, suddenly, that Remus was closer to him than he had been a moment ago. Had he moved closer, or had Remus? His skin stung with the nearness. For the first time since they’d started out, Sirius wished Mr Lupin had not cast his Impervius charm. Remus wet would have been bad enough. The swim in Loch Trool on the day they’d packed up their camping gear and begun the homeward hike had been torturous. Remus was graceful as a dolphin in water, and the late-morning sunlight glinting off the droplets that clung to his body had almost been too much for poor, smitten Sirius. This, however, was worse. The raindrops glanced away from his skin like the softest of kisses and the sight made everything inside Sirius writhe with the desire to be one of those raindrops, to be that close to that skin, and hair. And now he couldn’t simply duck under the water to hide what he felt. He wanted to transform and frisk mindlessly at Remus' side. He wanted to slip on the mud and knock himself unconscious.

“Here’s the roundabout,” Remus said, and there it was. And there, on the other side, was an old maple tree with a large chunk of bark gouged out of its trunk. An old wound, and one that would never really heal. The tree was alive, though. The leaves were green, and heavy with water.

They had stopped walking.

“So,” Sirius said, making a attempt at joviality, “that’s where ickle Moony made his first mischief.”

“Not my first,” said Remus ruefully. “Not by any means. They were protective of me, but they also--doted. I knew, and I took advantage. Sometimes. I wasn’t spoiled. I just knew what to say, I guess, and how to say it, to get what I wanted. I wish they’d been harder on me about the car. Mum got it in Italy, before she married Dad. It was one of the last things they had from the old days. Before I was bitten and they had to spend almost everything they saved just to keep me alive. I think I might have acted out a little more after the crash. You know, so they’d be more angry with me. It worked a bit, but I didn’t feel any better. So, mostly, really, I was good.”

“Kind of the opposite of me,” Sirius said, still eyeing the maple. “My parents don’t give a damn about me, but they did spoil me, when I was younger. Which is strange, because I was always saying the _wrong_ things. I guess they bought me stuff to keep me occupied. Or to bribe me. Mostly, I was bad, I guess.” Some force made him turn and look at Remus just then, and he would always be glad he did, because if he had not, he’d have missed that warm, brief smile, which Remus gave him as he said,

“You _are_ good. Mostly. It’s your parents that’re rotten.” The smile fell abruptly. “My dad’s sick.”

He’d said it very casually. “He looked all right to me,” Sirius said without thinking.

“You’ve barely seen him,” said Remus. “We were out camping. You saw him for five minutes at Victoria Station this June. He’s not all right. He’s gotten thinner and--and he gets tired. A lot.” Remus still sounded calm, except for the very slight tremor in his voice.

“Oh.” Sirius felt like an idiot. 

A car went by just then. They moved aside to avoid the splash, and watched until the taillights had disappeared into the mist. Then Sirius said, “Well, what’s the matter?”

“Don’t really know, yet,” said Remus, still watching the road. “We were in London in July. At St Mungo’s. For tests. I thought about calling on you. See how you were holding up. But-- I don’t know. I didn’t. Anyway, the healers at St Mungo’s couldn’t find anything. So, it’s not a magical illness. At first we’d thought it might have been a hex of some sort. A slow-acting one. Dad’s been hexed before. Because of me. Although, that was before we moved out of town. I don’t know how anyone would have found out. We pretty much keep to ourselves. My family, I mean. So, it’s not a hex.”

“So, what is it?”

“I said we don’t know, yet. Mum convinced Dad to see a Muggle doctor. I’ve told you how she is. If something doesn’t have to do directly with magic, she prefers the Muggle way. They went the week before you came here. We’re still waiting for the results.”

The conversation’s tone had changed too quickly. Sirius felt winded. “I see. So--I’ve been in the way, I take it. You should’ve told me.”

“You haven’t been in the way,” Remus assured him quickly. “You’ve been a welcome distraction to them, believe me. Dad loves to show off his cooking skills and Mum--well, she’s always wanted another son. She thinks you’re charming.” He shrugged.

“I see,” Sirius said again, not sure what else to say. “So…”

“So, nothing,” Remus said, turning his shoulders slightly, but avoiding Sirius’ gaze. “We don’t know what’s going to happen, yet.”

“So, it could be nothing.”

“It’s not nothing.”

“I mean, he’ll be all right.”

“No… I don’t think he will be.”

“Bollocks.”

Remus winced.

“I mean,” Sirius began again, and once more that evening he was aware of how closely they were standing, and how far away they seemed. It occurred to Sirius--unfortunately, perhaps--that if Remus were one of his girlfriends--or any girl, he supposed--he’d have put his arm around him long before this. Remus had held him, he remembered, the day Maddin had dumped him. She’d really hurt him. Well, she’d dealt his pride a severe blow, snogging Robert Maxwell in the dining hall and making him look like a complete berk. He’d gone straight to the dorm and found Remus there, revising, and broken down completely. And Remus had put his arms around him, and held him until he’d quieted. 

Remus had looked after him, too, that time Bellatrix had hexed him in the back, the day Regulus had been Sorted into Slytherin. He’d spread some kind of goop onto Sirius’ scorched skin, but more importantly, he’d simply been there, listening and soothing. Sirius had told him about his sister that day. He’d never spoken about her to anyone, before. Not even to James.

Remus began to speak again, and only then did Sirius realise he’d never completed his sentence. He had no time to wonder how long he’d been drifting. Remus said, still not looking at him, and still with that eerily calm voice, said, “He was so proud of me, the day I got my Hogwarts letter, the day I got my wand. Twelve inches of beechwood, with a griffon feather at its core. He said it was the wand of a Gryffindor. He was really proud of me when I got Sorted into Gryffindor. He was never surprised. I never surprised him when I succeeded at anything. Mum was sometimes surprised, but Dad…never. The odd thing is, he never took anything I did for granted, either. I mean, he was _always_ proud of me. He knew I’d have trouble, being what I am, but he always thought I’d succeed. I used to get angry about that. A bit. That’s fucked up, isn’t it?”

The cuss cut through Sirius’ stupor. “It’s not,” he assured Remus. 

“I mean,” Remus went on, “it’s not like he pretends things aren’t hard for me. He knows they are. They _are_. It’s not fair.” He blinked suddenly, and looked away again before Sirius could see if there really were tears in his eyes. “It’s not fucking fair,” he muttered, his voice cracking, finally, over the words. “I’m a werewolf. We’re poor. I’m not ready for this, too. I mean,” he went on hastily, “we don’t really know for certain, yet. But. Peter--lost his father. When he was four. That’s different. I know it sounds horrible, but it _is_ different. He’s _normal_. He’s so bloody normal.” He had tenuous control of his voice, again. Sirius heard the way it wobbled, slightly, but he no longer seemed to be on the verge of collapse--if indeed he ever had been. “Could I have a fag, please?”

Remus only ever smoked when he was agitated and trying to maintain an aura of calm. Relieved that at last there was something he could do, Sirius dug into his jeans pocket at once and dug out his pack of cigarettes. He passed one to Remus, who put it between his lips--his hands were trembling slightly, Sirius noted--and took a long, deep drag the instant it lit itself. 

“Better?” Sirius asked around his own cigarette.

Remus shrugged, then shook his head. “I feel like such a freak.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Sirius said, which was, he realised a moment too late, the wrong thing to say. Remus’ lashes lifted to reveal dry eyes, but the strain behind them was so obvious that Sirius nearly choked on his mouthful of smoke. “I mean,” he said quickly, “you’ll never be a freak to us, if that’s what you’re afraid of. Never. I mean--aren’t we all a bit freakish?”

“James isn’t. Peter isn’t. You’re not. I wish I were a bit more like you.”

“Really?” said Sirius dryly, raising his eyebrows. “You’d prefer to be a Black? With my lovely relatives?” He’d said it jokingly, but he was beginning to be annoyed. Remus so rarely indulged in self-pity, but when he did, Sirius wanted to hit him, to shock him back to his senses. 

“No,” Remus said. And he did sound somewhat chagrined. “Of course not. I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant, anyway. What I’m trying to say is, I have to struggle for everything. But you-- You really don’t. I mean, you don’t have to. Yes, you’ve got an awful family. I know that. I didn’t forget. But you don’t always have to be with them. You spend your holidays with James, or at school. And you fit in…well, everywhere. Everyone likes you. Not the Slytherins and your crazy family. The teachers like you, even though you don’t do your homework half the time. James’ parents adore you. My parents adore you. You make friends just by turning around. I can only think of a handful of girls who wouldn’t love to be pulled by you, and of those few, you’ve dated all except Evans. You’re brilliant at magic. And everyone wants you. You’re a real asshole a lot of the time, and still everyone wants you. You see? You don’t _have_ to struggle. You only do because you like it.”

“Shut up,” snapped Sirius. They were both trembling now, and staring at each other. Remus’ face was very pale. Although the rain did not touch him, it still seemed to have washed all the colour from him. He hadn’t meant to be cruel. Sirius knew that, but at the same time he could not stop himself from continuing: “Just shut up. Stop putting yourself down, and stop raising me up. I don’t deserve it, and neither the hell do you. Anyway,” he added, wondering why he was saying this, “you’re wrong. There are some things you don’t know about me. I don’t fit in that well. I sure as hell don’t always get what I want. And I’m not talking about anyone’s parents. I’m more of a freak than you think.”

“Are you really? Tell me how.” 

“Leave it, Remus,” he warned. “Just don’t ask me.”

“Why not?” Remus asked, sounding genuinely curious. “I know more about you than almost anyone. What do you think makes you a freak? The fact that you once thought a star belonged to you? Or that you ran away when you were five? Or…” His voice trailed off, and Sirius was grateful.

“Yes,” he said gratingly. “More freakish than that.”

“But that wasn’t you. That was your family. Tell me something,” he pressed. “Tell me one thing about you that’s freakish. Something not related to your family.”

There was only one thing he could say that would bring Remus up short, jolt him from his pedestal. Still, he had not quite decided to say it when he heard the words spoken in his own voice:

“I think…I might be…gay.”


	4. Chapter 4

The rain continued to fall like a soft curtain. Two more cars went by, churning more mud onto the grass that lined the road, lights and radios piercing the gloom as they passed. Remus stared at him. “Gay,” he said. “Right. You. That’s rich.”

“It is, isn’t it?” said Sirius. “It’s true, though.”

“I don’t believe it.”

He sighed. “Remus, when the hell have I ever lied to you? Or anyone?”

The dark eyes regarded him for a moment, then glanced away slightly. “All right,” Remus said. “You don’t lie. But you like to take the mickey out of people.”

“Not you,” said Sirius tiredly. Now that he’d said the words--and Remus had acknowledged them, making it impossible for him to take them back--there was nothing he can do but continue, as cautiously as possible. Really, of all people, Remus ought to understand. That he should not puzzled Sirius in the extreme. And frustrated him. “It’s true,” he said again, slowly. “I just realised a few days ago, but it’s true. I wouldn’t tell you it was true, if it wasn’t. Not this. Why the hell would I want you to think _this_ about me, if it weren’t true? You have to believe me.”

“Why?” The word came out softly, and the brown gaze flicked back to Sirius’ face. “Really, I need to know why I should believe you. I know you don’t lie.” He waved one hand dismissively. “You’ve never lied to me, as far as I know. But--I just-- I just don’t see how _you_ can possibly be--” He shook his head. “Merlin, Padfoot, you sleep with _girls_. I’ve seen you with your girlfriends. I’ve never seen you look at a boy the way you look at them. Never. You’ve been sleeping with girls since you were--fourteen.”

There’d been a slight pause before the last word, and Sirius knew what Remus had stopped himself from saying. James and Peter knew that Sirius had shagged a girl--whose name he could not for the life of him remember--the summer they’d all gone to Cornwall together. The summer they’d all been fourteen--or, in Remus’ case, about to turn fourteen. They knew that, because that was what Sirius had told them. They assumed she’d been his first, because she was the first girl he’d ever bragged about having shagged. It wasn’t a lie; he’d simply never taken any pains to disillusion them. Only Remus knew that something had happened an entire year before that. That, and the fact that it had been somewhat unpleasant were all he knew, and all Sirius had any intention of letting anyone know.

Aware, suddenly, that the silence between them was stretching and that Remus’ eyes were reflecting greater and greater incredulity, Sirius said quickly, “I know. You don’t need to remind me.”

“I think I do,” said Remus. “Vanessa Fields--”

“Who the bloody hell was she?”

“The girl from Cornwall,” said Remus, dryly. “You told me about her the first day of classes. Our fourth year. After the full moon. You told me about her and--some other things. Do you even remember?”

Sirius did. Well, he remembered that day, and some of the things he’d told Remus, and what Remus had done for him. He didn’t remember talking about the girl, but he believed Remus, so he said nothing.

“Cynthia Stewart,” Remus continued. “Maddin Mayfair, Eleanor Kersey, Sylviana Naismith, Catriona Lynton-- The prettiest girls at Hogwarts. That aren’t Slytherins. Or Lily Evans,” he added, with a slight shrug. “Maddin broke your heart.”

“No, she didn’t.”

“Didn’t she?” said Remus, his eyebrows raised, his manner just shy of open accusation. “You cried on my shoulder. Over her. I remember that, Padfoot.”

Sirius remembered it, too, with some shame. “That wasn’t heartbreak,” he said. “That was frustration. And--anger, I guess.”

Remus looked unconvinced.

“Well, look,” said Sirius, and again felt anger ripple through him, “I trusted her. She snogged Maxwell in front of practically the entire school. That--hurt. I felt like an idiot. I _liked_ her. She was a friend, almost. I mean, she was the closest I’d ever come to having a friend who was a--girl. She was a team-mate. I _trusted_ her.”

“You felt the way Cynthia Stewart felt, when she found out you were shagging Maddin behind her back.” Remus’ tone was flat.

“Yes,” said Sirius. “Well, I don’t know. I guess. This isn’t about that.” The truth was, he had never given much thought to Cynthia Stewart’s feelings, or to any girl’s. He’d hurt Cyn, he supposed. It was, however, a muted sort of awareness; he’d felt little guilt then, and he felt little, now. He hadn’t intended to hurt her, after all. It was Regulus and his Slytherin friends who’d told Mackenzie he’d begun shagging Maddin. It was Mackenzie who’d announced the fact to the entire student body in the middle of a Quidditch match. It wasn’t as though Cyn had loved him. None of the girls he’d dated had, though a couple of them--he’d forgotten which--had told him they did. They’d wanted him for his name, his looks, the fact that he could get them into any dance club in London. It had been about pride. Always. For him, for them. Only _this_ time, it was different. But he couldn’t exactly say that to Remus, not when he was still glaring at him self-righteously. All he could say to that face was, “I know I was an asshole to Cyn. Will you forget about her? Just--forget about all of them. They never meant anything to me. I thought they did. I thought Maddin did, anyway. I was wrong.”

The little crease appeared between Remus’ eyebrows again. He lifted a hand to rub it, as though to smooth it out, or as though his head were hurting him. “That’s crazy. No--I believe you when you say they didn’t mean anything to you. They looked good next to you. That sounds cruel. I know that some of them were using you, too. But--Sirius, that doesn’t mean you’re gay.”

“It’s not working with Catriona,” he put in quickly. “She’s the hottest girl in our year, so it should work, shouldn’t it? Who wouldn’t want to get into her knickers? But the last time I was with her, I--” He flushed, and concentrated, not on Remus’ eyes, but on the rain that fell around his left shoulder. “It wasn’t-- Neither of us came.” It was not an easy admission to make. 

“Maybe you’re impotent.” It was a cruel thing to say. His gaze flashing back to Remus’, Sirius could tell that he had intended to wound, and knew that he’d succeeded. 

“I’m not impotent,” Sirius said. It came out more emphatically than he’d intended. Curiosity flickered in the level brown gaze. “I can do it--there’s no problem--when I’m…alone.”

“Maybe you’re with the wrong--”

“--when I’m thinking about a bloke. _A_ bloke. One bloke. There’s no problem, then.” He closed his eyes. This constant looking at Remus, and looking away, and then back was making him dizzy. And anyway, he did not want to see the look in the Remus' eyes when this particular bit of information sank in.

It took a moment. Then, “I see,” said Remus softly. “James.”

He’d whispered the name, but it too struck Sirius like a physical blow. James. Of course. Remus _would_ think that. Anyone would, upon learning the great Sirius Black no longer fancied skirts. James and Sirius, neither without the other, at least at school. One brain in two bodies. That was what everyone said. (Well, Lily Evans liked to say there was only half a brain between them, if that.) And superficially, he supposed it was true. Merlin, he and James had even been accused of using Occlumency on the Quidditch pitch. They were like brothers--far more so than Sirius and Regulus. They finished each other’s sentences, guessed each other’s moods, deferred to each other and to almost no one else. And yet, he thought--and became aware, as he did, that his hands were beginning to shake--and yet it was not James Potter who, over the years, had become the collector, the protector, of his secrets. James knew about Vanessa and all his conquests after her, but not the one before. Only Remus knew--not _what_ had happened, but that something _had_. Only Remus knew about Sirius’ elder sister, Electra, who’d died when he was six and who was the only member of his family he’d ever really loved. Remus had discovered her birthday, quite behind Sirius’ back, and each May since then, they’d observed--not celebrated--it, together. All three of them--James, Peter, and Remus--knew about the hidings and the thrashings he’d received as a child, but only Remus had ever asked about his scars, so it was only for Remus that he’d taken off his shirt and traced upon his skin, the paths they’d used to follow. It was for Remus that he’d become Padfoot, and it was Remus’ touch--behind his ears, under his muzzle, between his shoulder blades--that he craved.

“Not James,” he said.

“Not James,” Remus echoed. “All right. Who, then? Can you tell me?”

Sirius opened his eyes. Remus’ face was pale, almost ashen in the rain. Despite the Impervius charm, the ends of his hair clung damply to his neck and forehead, making him appear almost febrile. His chin was high, his shoulders thrown back. His eyes, which in certain lights were rich as mahogany, looked hard as agates, now, and reflected nothing. 

He could not say to that face, _It’s you. You’re my wet dream, my fantasy, the one I want inside me in every way possible._ The words writhed inside him, but he felt the lie rise behind them like a wave of nausea, and overtook them. He opened his mouth, and it was the lie that spilled out. “Just a boy,” he said numbly. “Just--just someone I met.”

“This summer?” said Remus, watching him.

“Yes.”

“In London?”

“No. After.” He swallowed. “In Alnwick.”

“When you were with Catriona?”

“Yeah.” For the first time in days, Cat’s face swam before him. Beautiful Cat. Eyes like January ice, hair the colour of certain peaches. He tried to remember what they’d done, but it was all a blur. There’d been drinking. Dancing. They’d gone from club to club, flashing fake IDs, sometimes just pushing their way through because a Black and a Lynton could do whatever they damn well pleased. There’d been other people with them--Cat’s friends from around Alnwick. He couldn’t remember their names, or their faces. There’d been a few boys. He gave one of them Cat’s features, and her surname. “A cousin,” he said, and felt as though he were standing outside his body, watching while someone unseen manipulated his mouth, pulled words from it, and hurled them, like gauntlets, at Remus' feet. “Cat had this cousin. Beautiful bloke. Grey eyes, that reddish-blond hair. A little older. Well, just a year or so. He and I--” Did what, exactly? Remus continued to watch him like a statue. “We were dancing,” Sirius went on. He remembered his cigarette, and stuck it back between his lips, though the rain had long since doused it. “Groping, I guess. I don’t know. I guess we’d both been drinking. We kissed.”

He’d mumbled the last words. After them, nothing more came. The lie was out. It lay between them, on the pavement, coiled and twitching and seeping venom. 

Remus’ face clouded before his eyes, as though a veil had been drawn across it. He glanced at his cigarette, which, like Sirius’, had gone out. He studied it thoughtfully for a few moments. Then he dropped it into the mud at his feet and, without and word, turned on his heel, and started back down the street.

Sirius stared stupidly, until Remus’ outline had begun to blur in the mist. Then he shook himself and hurried after him, shouting, “Oi! Remus, what the fuck? Wait!” He overtook him in little time, and stood in front of him, barring his way, his arms at his sides, his fingers splayed. “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”

“Home,” said Remus tersely. “I’m not hungry, anymore.”

“Hungry?” He’d forgotten, actually, the reason for their jaunt into town. 

“And I think you should go. To Alnwick,” Remus elaborated, when Sirius said nothing. “I think you should go back to Cat. You should go right now. Before you say anything else to me. That you’ll want to take back.”

“I don’t want to go back to Cat. I don’t _want_ Cat.” This could not be happening. The person before him, this angry person who was ordering him back to his girlfriend, could not be his Remus. “Haven’t you heard a damn thing?”

“I heard,” said Remus. “I’m sorry. I can’t help you with this. You need to figure it out on your own. Or with Cat. I mean-- Just go.” He drew his wand from his pocket. Before he could raise it, however, Sirius lunged for him, seized him by the wrist.

“Tell me why,” he demanded. Remus struggled, but Sirius was stronger, and held him fast. “Is it because I’m gay?”

“Partly.”

" _Partly_? You fucking hypocrite!” Frustration made him mean. He shook Remus, hard, and shouted, “You are a werewolf! Did I stop being your friend when I figured that out? Did I tell you to get the fuck away from me?”

“Shut _up_!” Inflamed with anger, Remus’ voice cut the air between them. He yanked his wrist free and staggered back, nearly falling into the mud, but catching himself in time. “Just shut up! Are you insane? Just be quiet! Listen. You’re not letting me explain. I don’t want you here, partly because you think you’re gay. Partly because I’m a werewolf.” His voice shook, but he almost had it under control. He lowered it as he said, “I don’t want you here for the full moon. Not because of what you said,” he added quickly, when Sirius would have protested. “I’ve been thinking about it since you got here, and I’ve decided. It wouldn’t be good for anyone. My parents don’t know you’re an Animagus. Tomorrow night they’re going to lock me in the shed. It’s what they’ve always done, Padfoot, when I’m home for the full moon. It’s not any worse than the Shrieking Shack, really. Just smaller. It’s not like they have a choice.” It wasn’t just Remus’ voice that shook. Every particle that made up Sirius Black ached to touch him, but Remus’ gaze rendered him immobile. Remus raised his wand. He said, “You can’t be in the shed with me when I transform, and you can’t let me out. Not without Prongs. I’m a monster. I’m stronger than you. I’ll get away from you. I’ll hurt people. You know I’d rather die than let that happen.” 

There was a deafening _bang!_ behind Sirius. He felt it with his body; his ears only heard Remus’ words. As he watched, Remus’ face flared in the approaching headlights. His eyes, Sirius saw for the first time, were red-rimmed, but still dry.

A moment later, a violently purple, triple-Decker bus screeched to halt beside the curb. 

“I’ll send your things to you,” Remus said. “Tomorrow, if I can get to the post.”

The Knight Bus’s door opened, and a witch in a purple uniform stepped out. “Two?” she inquired, sounding tired.

“One,” said Remus. 

Sirius had not noticed he’d moved, but suddenly his hand was on his arm, pushing him gently toward the waiting bus. 

“Please,” Remus said quietly. “For once, just do what I tell you. Go to Cat. Or her cousin. Whoever. Figure yourself out. I can’t help you, and it’s because--I _am_ gay. I’ve known it for a year.” His wry smile had to have taken all his remaining strength. It took all Sirius’ remaining strength not to break under it. “So you see, I’ll always be the bigger freak.”

He was on the bus before he was quite aware of Remus breaking contact. Then there was a door between them, and on the pavement outside, in the rain, Remus was turning and beginning to walk away.

The witch, who appeared to be the conductor, had taken him by the sleeve and was trying to tug him away from the door. “Oi, there, lad,” she grunted. “Someone Stun you? Where were you wantin’ to go?”

_If my true love, he should leave me  
I will never find another…_

“Alnwick,” he heard himself utter tonelessly. Then he was putting silver into the witch’s hand, and she was prodding him, not very gently, in the direction of one of a half-dozen brass bedstead. Then there was another tremendous _bang!_ and Sirius was knocked flat. 


	5. Chapter 5

First the Knight Bus stopped in London, in Diagon Alley. Sirius considered getting off there, but Remus had told him to go back to Catriona, and he could not find it in him to disobey Remus. After London, the bus jumped to Bath. Then Tywyn. Then Glasgow. Then it jumped all the way up to Orkney, so a stooped old wizard could get off at Stromness. It was well past midnight when the bus screeched to a halt in the Market Square in Alnwick, and Sirius stumbled off, ill from lack of sleep, lack of food, and from the constant jostling of the bus. The moon, a breath away from full, was sinking toward the western horizon. 

_Leave him alone_ , Sirius thought warningly at the distant satellite, as he stumbled over the cobblestones in the direction of the medieval arch of Hotspur Tower, just visible against the slowly lightening sky. _Leave him alone, just leave him alone._

Nothing was open this early. Even the pubs had been closed for hours, which was just as well, since he didn’t fancy passing the hours until Catriona woke, in a dimly-lit, smoke-filled room full of strangers. He _was_ hungry, but he supposed he would simply have to wait. He had no desire to wake Cat himself. For one thing, he did not know if her parents were back, yet, from Barcelona; and for another, he did not want to see her in her short silk pyjamas, her hair disheveled, her face soft and free of makeup. It wasn’t that he harboured any fear of falling for her again, if indeed he had ever fallen. He had found his haven, and if that haven rejected him, it did not stop it being his. All interaction with Catriona Lynton must, henceforth, be strictly casual. He had decided that on the bus. It was the only thing he had managed to decide.

It wasn’t warm, yet, but neither was it too terribly cold. The jacket he had on was sufficient. The cobblestones were wet from the recent rain; water ran along the uneven curb, toward the gutter. The air tasted damp. Clammy. Well, Alnwick was just a few miles from the coast. For a brief moment, Sirius considered transforming and running off to the shore. It would be something to do, certainly. He usually enjoyed frightening seagulls, and the feel of sand beneath his paws. He decided against it, though. He would only have to come back, and he would stumble up the Lyntons’ walkway, starving, exhausted, and covered with sand. 

He ended up crouching in the arch’s shadow, his collar turned up around his jaw, his hands in his pockets, a cigarette between his teeth, his gaze on the fading stars. There were a few still visible above the western horizon, now that the moon had set completely. _Good. Stay away. We don’t need you. Just leave him alone._

A salt-laced breeze swept through the street, gathering and spilling his fringe over his forehead, rippling the surfaces of the puddles around him. He shivered lightly.

_I will build my love a bower  
By yon clear and crystal fountain…_

What the hell was a bower? Sirius wondered. A bed, most likely. He thought about Remus’ bed in the Shrieking Shack. A magnificent bed, to be sure, though Merlin knew why Dumbledore had bothered. Remus never spent more than half an hour in it, each month. The sheets were cleaned, magically, after every use. Sirius had first seen the bed his second year. Remus had given all his friends a tour of the Shrieking Shack, his cage, after they’d discovered his secret--and convinced him they still wanted to be his friend. Peter, winded from the long walk to the Whomping Willow, had plopped down on the edge of the bed. Remus had not gone near it, had stood in a corner and looked at everything, it had seemed, except for the bed and the faces of his three friends. Sirius had not seen the bloodstains until after he’d become an Animagus…

How nice would it be, he thought, to build a bed for Remus Lupin, that had no associations with pain or blood or loneliness? A splendid four-poster, with silk sheets, or maybe flannel for winter, a duvet stuffed with softest down, and roomy enough for two.

_I will build my love a bower…_

I’ll one-up you, Sirius challenged silently, and blew smoke out of the corner of his mouth. I’ll build my love a house. The grandest palace in the world couldn’t contain what I feel, so this’ll be a modest house, with enough room for that gorgeous bed, and all his books. With enormous windows facing east, so he’ll always have sunlight on his cheek when he wakes. It’ll be far away from any villages, this house, maybe on a tropical island in the middle of some southern sea, with enough land surrounding it for a wolf and a dog to run until they tire, under the moonlight.

_And on it I will pile  
all the flowers of the mountain…_

What sort of flowers did boys give each other? Did boys even give each other flowers? For the first time since his revelation, it occurred to Sirius that he did not know the first thing about being gay. Naturally, _some_ of the blokes at Hogwarts were poofs. It stood to reason. He’d never given them much thought, though. They had, he realised with chagrin, been rather beneath his notice. Until Remus’ announcement, he hadn’t even known he’d had any gay friends. _He_ didn’t feel any different, except for this sudden, all-consuming desire to cast himself at the feet of his male friend--whom he hoped was still his friend. He certainly had no intention of trading his black leather jacket for something petal pink.

Did he _walk_ like a poof? No one had ever said anything, and you would think someone--a Slytherin someone--would have, if he did. Remus didn’t. Remus’ wrists weren’t limp. Sirius held his own out before him and studied them. They seemed sturdy enough. Naturally, they would. They’d been swinging Beater clubs for years.

He tilted his head back against the arch and closed his eyes. If he liked boys-- _a_ boy--then he was a poof. If he was a poof, then, by society’s standards, he was a freak. The thing was-- 

His cigarette had burnt to a stub. He dropped it onto the cobblestones, pulled out another, and lit it. 

The thing was…it was _Remus_. And he did not understand--he tried, but he simply did not understand--how it could ever be freakish to care for Remus. For _anyone_ to care for Remus.

_And on it I will pile  
All the flowers of the mountain…_

What sort of flowers could one gather for Remus Lupin? Thistles, of course, for Scotland. Also, because they were nice to look at, but prickly to touch. A single rose, perhaps, for England, should he ever be so lucky as to win his way back into Remus’ good graces. (He would think of the _how_ , later, after he’d had some sleep.) Thyme, which was not a flower, but it had been in Mr Lupin’s song, and it grew wild. Purple heather, for the same reasons. Cotton grass, for the Henderson clan, with which the Lupins had distant ties. Yellow gorse, because of the way the sunlight had flashed off the droplets of water that clung to Remus’ skin as he’d emerged from Loch Trool. Bluebells, because they grew on the far side of the lake at Hogwarts, and that was where he and Remus observed Electra Black’s birthday, every May. Night-blooming cereus, because the name amused him.

All of these, he thought blearily, I will gather and pile on my love’s bower, in the house I’m going to build for him. If he takes me back. If he ever comes to see me as something more than a friend. If he still sees me as a friend, at all.

How was it Remus had managed to be gay for so long, right under their noses? It had taken them slightly more than a year to figure out that he was a werewolf, but there had been clues for them to piece together: the monthly disappearances, the scars, the avoidance of all things silver. This time, he’d given them none. Sirius’ memory raced back across the past year, but he could recall no accidental mention of a boyfriend, no sidelong glances at other blokes. There had never been any mention of a _girl_ friend, or any ogling of any girls, either, he realised, with a slight jolt. Well, it made sense for Remus not to have a girlfriend. James and Sirius had discussed the matter, once, and the conclusion they’d reached was that Remus would have worried about a girlfriend discovering his secret as his mates had done. _That_ made sense. But not to _look_ at all? Toward James and Sirius’ various girlfriends, Remus had always seemed completely neutral. This one was pretty, that one had made an interesting point in their last Charms class. And, full of themselves and their conquests, they’d accepted that as they’d accepted Peter’s fawning adoration. 

Why hadn’t he _told_ them? They hadn’t abandoned him when, cornered, he’d admitted, finally, that he was a werewolf. Sirius told himself firmly that he and James and Peter would have been just as understanding had Remus come to them and informed them that he fancied blokes.

Unless, of course…

Well, unless he fancied one of _them_. They’d still have been accepting, probably, but…it would have rendered the situation considerably dodgier. Sirius could understand his reluctance, in that case. Merlin, he’d felt the same way. 

All right, then. Who? Not Peter, he thought immediately. Remus had always been kinder to Peter than either James or Sirius, but the thought of them together… No, he thought, when he’d wiped the image from his mind, it had to be either him or James. 

_James_ , Remus had said softly, when Sirius had admitted to him that he’d been getting off, lately, by thinking about a bloke. Of course Remus would assume it was James, but had there been any jealousy in his tone when he’d said that? Sirius had not been looking at his face, then, had not seen his expression. Had there been relief when Sirius had informed him that it wasn’t James?

He couldn’t think about that. He couldn’t recall every time he’d spotted James and Remus together and compare it with all the times _he_ had been with Remus. If he tried, he’d end up hating James, and he could not, he thought wretchedly, afford to hate James, even for Remus’ sake. 

He couldn’t _think_.

He turned his head, slightly, so he could watch the dawn, which was breaking, slowly. In the east, the sky was rose-coloured, and becoming lighter. He was so tired. His neck was trembling with the effort of keeping his head up. Perhaps Catriona would let him sleep on her sofa, just for a few hours. If she didn’t…he didn’t know where he would go. Not to London, not back to his parents’ house. To an inn, perhaps. He had money. Even if it was not enough, there were few wizard-run inns that could afford to turn away even an empty-pocketed Black.

There were seagulls all around him. He had not noticed them in the darkness. They were drinking from the puddles or rummaging for scraps in the gutters. One of them, lulled, apparently, by his stillness, ventured quite close to one booted foot. He waited until it was within pecking distance. Then he transformed and lunged, sending the seagull and many of its brethren, screeching indignantly, into the air. 

The sudden movement snapped him from his stupor. The rest of the town was waking. Soon there would be cars, pedestrians, and other dogs.  
It was time to see Cat. Time, finally, to do one thing right.

 

The Lyntons had a beautiful, old house, about a mile outside Alnwick. A walkway, shaded by pear trees, led up to the main gate, which, it being summer, was nearly invisible behind a wall of climbing roses in full bloom. It was there that Catriona found him, his back to one of the ancient trees, his head on his shoulder, some hours later. He woke when she said his name, and, blinking the sleep from his eyes, gazed up at her, mutely.

The afternoon sunlight fell through the pale green leaves, onto her strawberry-blond hair, which spilled over her shoulders and down her back like a silken veil. Her skin, in the shade, was the colour of limestone, and as smooth. Her white, suede bellbottoms clung to her legs, and her linen peasant blouse left little to the imagination. She was at once, he thought, impossibly beautiful, and wholly undesirable.

“’Lo, Cat,” he mumbled.

“Hello,” she replied carefully. Her sculpted features betrayed neither delight at his appearance, nor dismay. Her eyes were shadowed by her long, fair lashes. 

Best to do it quickly, he thought. Before he got himself caught in any more quagmires. He did not think she would be _too_ put out. She was the one, after all, who had sent him away in the first place. 

To Remus, who, in one night, had changed his life--or else made him understand it, finally--and then sent him back.

He opened his mouth again, but no sound came from it. He sat there for a long moment, just like that, as though, at any second, he expected the words to leap to his lips. They did not. He was at a loss, and he felt incredibly stupid. Really, _this_ should be the easy part. He’d done it often enough in the past. True, the circumstances were now very different, but Cat did not have to know that. He hadn’t come here to tell her he was gay. Just to tell her they were no longer the hope of their two ancient and noble families.

Fortunately, she was not a Ravenclaw--as all the Lyntons had been--for nothing. She said, without emotion, “I told before you left that it wasn’t working. I think you’re here to tell me it’s not going to work.”

Grateful, he nodded.

“I see. Well, I should like to know why.” Now her voice shook--but only slightly. She was either deeply upset--which he doubted--and struggling to hide it, or, she was only mildly upset, and taking no pains at all to disguise the fact.

He ought to feel something, he thought. Regret, perhaps. It would have been nice if it could have worked between them. There was nothing really wrong with Catriona Lynton. She simply was not what he wanted or needed. Which was not her fault. So, she deserved some kind of explanation.

“I met someone else,” he said, and waited for her reaction.

But, “I see,” was all she said. Then, a little too quickly, “You’ll get grass stains, sitting there. Won’t you come in? You look horrid--I mean, tired. Are you hungry? I can have our House Elf make you something. You can sleep--” She broke off abruptly.

“It’s not your fault,” Sirius told her. He felt behind him, with one hand, for the tree trunk, and, finding it, used it to push himself up. “Honestly, Cat, it’s not you,” he said, more emphatically, when he was standing and looking down at her. “It’s me. And this other person.”

“I see,” she said again. “Someone you met in Scotland?”

“Yes.” That was not a lie. Remus had, in a way, become a new person to him.

“Not someone I know?”

“Not really.” She’d never gotten to know his friends, after all. None of his girlfriends had, except for Maddin, but that had only been because she’d played Quidditch with him and James.

“A pureblood?”

“No.”

“Is she--is she prettier than I am? I know how that sounds, but really, I only wonder--”

He cut her off: “No, Cat.” He ought, he knew, to take her by the shoulders and either shake her or kiss her forehead reassuringly. He shouldn’t leave her like this. But it was all he could do. “This person--” He had to stop, think for just a moment, then begin again. “There’s nothing for you to wonder about. You’re not _lacking_ anything. There’s no competition between the two of you. And I don’t mean that as an insult, in any way. To you or them. You’re just--different.” _If you knew how different…_ “You are one of the most beautiful girls I’ve ever met. And you’re smart. And--nice.”

“I know who I am,” she said, sounding tired. “This--” and with a brisk wave of her hand she summed herself up-- “didn’t just _happen_.”

“All right. Well--” He shook his head. “This isn’t about you. Really. This other person-- I think I’m falling in love with this person.” The shadowed eyes widened. He hurried on, “I know it sounds mad. You probably think I’m barking. It _is_ a bit mad. It has nothing to do with you. It’s about me, and who I am, and this other person--”

“This other person,” Catriona interrupted. “Does she-- Do you think she loves you, too?”

The air hurt his lungs. “No,” he managed to say. “Well, I don’t really know. It doesn’t matter. I mean, it does, of course, but what this person feels…doesn’t really change what I feel. This person could hate me--they might, actually--and it still wouldn’t change the fact that we’re not going to work. You and me. I’m sorry, Cat.”

“I suppose I should be grateful,” she said, “that you’re telling me at all.”

Her words stung, but he accepted them. 

He accepted it, too, when she said, her fingers twisting together in front of her, “I never loved you. I don’t mean to hurt you by saying that. I just want you to know I was never using you. I wasn’t going to say it until I meant it, if I ever did.” She did not need to say _unlike some_. “I liked you. You can be a bit of a berk, but I liked you best of all the boys my parents have approved of, so far. We had fun.”

There was no reason to disagree. 

“So,” she said, with a resigned sigh, “are you going to go, now? I mean, where _are_ you going to go? Back to Lupin?”

He started.

“Well,” she went on, frowning at him, “aren’t you going to go back so you can see this other person, whoever she is? I thought you met her in Scotland, while you were with Lupin. He knows about her. I mean, why else would he send me this note?” And before his bewildered gaze, she slipped one hand into the pocket of her trousers and drew out a small, folded piece of parchment. She passed it to Sirius, who took it with trembling fingers and unfolded it, slowly. “An owl brought it, this morning. That was how I knew you’d be coming. And how I was able to guess why. I came out here to look for you. Didn’t you wonder?”

He’d stopped hearing her some time before she’d ceased speaking. On the parchment, were three terse lines in Remus’ neat handwriting:

_I am sending him to you. He should be there by mid-morning, at the latest. Whatever he says to you, please be kind to him. -R. Lupin_

*

He was back on the Knight Bus in under an hour. It had taken him that long to find a rucksack--Cat had leant him one--and to fill it with healing potions and bandages from the Lyntons’ cabinets. Cat had tried to force some food upon him, and to get him to sit down and if not rest for a moment then at least explain things to her, but he had refused. He’d left her standing in the middle of the tree-lined path leading up to her house, and had not looked back.

The bus was packed with witches and wizards. It being day, there were no brass beds, so he had to contain himself in a seat, sandwiched between two plump, elderly witches who spent the entire ride from Manchester to Dover chattering about their grandchildren and the outrageous price of powdered bat dung. Some time after Dover they noticed Sirius, with his uncombed hair, his low-slung bellbottoms, and his scowl. It was a very long ride to Buxton, where they finally exited--after one last trenchant remark, each, about his general appearance and generation.

After that, it was a long ride to Nottingham, and then a long ride to Pembroke.

It seemed a long ride to _everywhere_.

When, at last, the bus came to a screeching halt outside Waverley Station in Edinburgh, it was nearly dark and Sirius had lost all patience. He bolted from the bus, ignoring the conductor’s protest that there were still three more stops before Melrose, and, as soon as his boots touched pavement, he began to run.

He ran until he’d left the tall buildings of the city behind and entered a neighbourhood dominated by concrete houses surrounded by wrought iron fences. There he halted and, leaning heavily against a lit streetlamp, tried to catch his breath and assess his situation.

By now it _was_ dark, and the moon was close to rising. He could see, when he looked east, toward Holyrood Park and Arthur’s Seat, a faint silver glow outlining the distant crags. He would never make it in time for Remus’ transformation. The admission sickened him, but there was nothing he could do. If he had known how Apparate, he would have done so, gladly, and risked all the consequences. All he could do was take one last gulp of air, glance round quickly to make sure he was alone on the street, transform, and make for Melrose and Remus as quickly as possible.

He had never run so far, or so swiftly, not even that night--unbelievably, only four nights ago--when he’d been desperate to outrun his heart. As it had that night, the horizon seemed to stretch away from him, so that no matter how many hills he crested or streams he forded, he seemed no closer to his destination than he had been in Edinburgh. He only knew that time was passing and that the moon had risen when, while leaping over a stream, he happened to glance down and saw that the water was luminous with moonlight. As his paws touched the earth on the other side, a howl ripped from his throat.

_No! Leave him alone! Leave him alone!_

He could not yet smell the wolf.

So, he ran on, over major roads, dodging traffic, across fields, over fences, past houses. He’d been running out of time all day. Now there was no time. Now, if he was to make it to Remus in the nick of time, he would have to be the knife, nicking time, cutting time, slicing through it with all his energy, all his spirit, all his desire. Above him, the constellations wheeled like a whirlpool. Beneath him, the earth turned. He could spare these things no thought. He was no longer a part of them. He was movement, he was speed, he was--

_There_. At the top of one hill, finally, he smelled him. The wolf. His wolf. It was not a good smell. It was redolent with pain, and fear, and irrational anger. But it was _his_. 

The moon was still overhead, in the western part of the sky, but not yet setting.

Here was time. Not much of it, but enough, just enough, for what he had to do.

If he paused to think about the distance he had covered, he would collapse. Better not to let his body know, until after it had served its purpose. So, he did not think at all. He simply descended the hill, trotted up the narrow path to the small house, jumped over the low stone fence, and went round back to where the shed stood. 

The dog heard nothing until he’d passed the invisible boundary of the Silencing charm. He knew the moment he had done so because of the howls that suddenly rent the air. Desperate, pain-filled howls. And the thump of a heavy body against a door that would not give. And the harsh drag of claws across wood.

_It’s all right. Stop that, now. I’m here. You know me. I’m here._

The dog whined reassuringly to the closed door, and from behind it, the wolf answered back, puzzled.

_I’m here. I’m here. I’m here._

The wolf knew him, knew his scent, his sound. The savage howling broke off to be replaced with something new--a piteous keening that defied translation, but which the dog understood deep in his blood, and to which he could respond, without thought.

They remained like that, one on either side of the door, communicating in a way that the humans they became, as yet, could not. When, at moonset, the wolf became aware of the boy inside him, struggling to be free and gaining strength, and turned his terrible claws and teeth upon himself, the dog did not hesitate. He transformed, unbolted and threw open the shed door. He’d transformed again before he’d even crossed the threshold, before the wolf, mad with pain, and fighting to maintain his shape, became aware of his presence. Then he fell on top of the wolf and held him down, dodging flailing teeth and claws, enduring the howls of pain and betrayal, securing, reassuring--

_no you don’t, no you don’t, stop it, stop it_

\--until the shape beneath him was not a wolf’s, but a boy’s, and the scent in his nostrils was not the one he’d chased tonight over field and stream, but the one he’d held in his memory like a talisman. Until the cries of pain choked off and the figure beneath him ceased thrashing and stilled, except for the occasional shudder. When those, too, had stopped, the dog backed away and transformed.

The feeble rays of dawn spilled through the shed’s open door and onto Remus Lupin’s pale, naked form. He lay on his side, with his legs tucked up beneath him, and one hand thrust in front of his face as though to protect it or rend it. Sweat darkened his hair, but he was shivering. There were scratches on his arms, his sides, and thighs. He looked like something the night had toyed with, and then discarded.

Now Sirius had to think, but now he found he could not, neither about what he had done nor what he had to do. Remus claimed all of his senses. The angry red streaks marring the white skin seared his vision. The scent of fear and blood choked him. The curling, delicate fingers hurt him more deeply than any curse or any lashing his mother had ever dealt him. So, in the end, it was instinct that guided Sirius’ trembling hands to the rucksack he’d brought with him from Alnwick, that undid the clasp and withdrew the bandages and potions he’d taken when he’d still been capable of thought. 

An invisible force brought him to his knees beside Remus, made him remove his own jacket and wrap it, carefully, about the thin, bare shoulders. Made him take that one fragile hand between his own and clasp it to his chest.

His mouth moved. The words he was trying to say were, _I’m here. I’m here. It’s going to be all right. I’ll take care of you._ He never managed to produce them, but Remus seemed to have heard, anyway. The fair lashes twitched, then lifted, slowly. The brown eyes stared blindly for a moment, then focused on his face.

“ _Go_. M’parents… _please_ …”

It was the ghost of a voice, but it belonged to Remus so Sirius heard it and, finally, it was what broke him.

“I’m sorry,” he half-sobbed. “I’m so sorry. I lied, before. It’s you, you idiot. It’s you. I won’t leave again. I’m sorry I lied. I can’t do it anymore. I can’t pretend you don’t mean more to me than anyone else in the world.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter contains references to non-consensual incest involving a minor. See my notes from Chapter One for specifics. Again, if you want to skip over it, it starts with the line: "I've been doing it for three," and ends with "That would put me off women too."

The Lupins had a nice garden, Sirius thought. It was about a twentieth the size of the Lyntons’, and it wasn’t nearly as splendid, but he liked it. There was a small, flagstone-lined fishpond that did not seem to contain any fish, and it was by this that he sat. There were a few rhododendrons, well-cultivated by Sylvie Lupin, and a sundial, and a birdbath from which a swallow was currently drinking. Beside the shed, which looked small and dilapidated in the bright morning sunlight, there stood a gnarled, old apple tree. Remus had been climbing it, he’d told Sirius once, since before he’d been bitten, almost since he’d been able to walk. There’d been a treehouse in it, once, that Remus and his father had built together. A gale had knocked the treehouse down five years ago, and nearly killed the tree, but until then it had been Remus’ haven, his pirate’s lair, and in it, he’d kept his favourite possessions: his books, his maps, postcards from his cousins in France, little trinkets he’d picked up and fancied keeping. 

Sirius had never had such a haven. Everything he’d ever owned had been subject to his parents’ inspection, his room included. He knew that while he was away at school, his mother had Kreacher, their House Elf, enter his room and catalogue everything he found there. Sirius had long ago given up protesting this violation. There was nothing he could do about it, save keep everything of any importance to him in the dorm in Gryffindor Tower, and keep the promise he’d made to himself that one day he would have a place of his own, to which his parents would never be admitted.

He supposed he ought to be jealous of Remus, but he wasn’t, even though he could not begin to imagine building a treehouse with his own father, in the backyard of Number 12 Grimmauld Place. He had never been jealous of Remus, and it had nothing to do with the fact that Remus was poor or that he was a werewolf. He was jealous, sometimes, of James. But then, there were times when James did not seem to realise just how good he had it. Remus never took anything for granted. Maybe that was it. Remus’ things were better off in Remus’ hands, and Sirius could enjoy them vicariously. Or enjoy giving Remus things.

_I will build my love a bower…_

Merlin, not that again. He groaned and pushed the heels of his palms against his forehead, as though he could press from his brain that nagging verse. He was too _tired_ for this. He wanted to sleep, but he couldn’t until he knew Remus was all right, and the Lupins weren’t letting him in to see Remus.

There hadn’t been a row when they’d found him in the shed that dawn, cradling their son and trying, rather unskilfully, to salve and bandage his wounds. There hadn’t been any accusations, or even any strong words. Nicholas Lupin had simply taken Remus from him--Sirius, numb with fatigue, had offered no resistance--and half-carried, half-led him to the house. Sylvie Lupin had remained behind for a few moments, watching him silently from the doorway. He had said nothing to her. There had been no point in denying what he’d done. Finally, she’d told him, in a tightly controlled voice, to wait, and then she had turned and started after her husband and son. She’d stopped after a few paces and glanced over her shoulder at him. “You don’t have to wait in there, Sirius,” she had said, sounding more weary than angry, but far from gentle. Then she had really left him.

A few minutes later he had risen, with difficulty, and stumbled across the yard to the pond, and there he had sat down to wait. 

He had been waiting, now, for about half an hour.

He wanted a fag. Unfortunately, the Lupins did not smoke--he doubted they had any idea their son lit up on occasion--and, he reckoned, would probably not appreciate it if he did so in their backyard. They probably did not appreciate his very _existence_ , at the moment, he thought sourly. They couldn’t know about Padfoot. Remus would _not_ have told them about that. There’d been nothing in Mrs Lupin’s tone to suggest that she knew or even suspected, that time she’d drawn Sirius aside and thanked him--and James and Peter--for all he’d done for her son. Nothing. Remus’ parents must have thought he’d returned to their house sometime during the night and camped out in their yard--close enough to the shed to have reached it before they did and, therefore, close enough for the wolf to have smelled him. They must have thought he’d placed their son and himself in terrible danger. They must have thought he was an idiot. A dangerous idiot.

“Sirius.”

It was Mrs Lupin. He hadn’t heard her approach. He glanced up to see her standing just a few feet away from him, a wooden tray in her hands. She bent and placed it, carefully, on the flagstones in front of him. “Eat,” she instructed, as he continued to look at her, quizzically. “You must be very hungry.”

There was toast on the tray, and what looked like raspberry jam, and scrambled eggs. There was a mug of hot chocolate, and a small dish of cream. His stomach lurched painfully. He _was_ hungry. He hadn’t eaten in… Merlin, he couldn’t even remember the last time he’d eaten. The past few days had all blurred into one. Before he could touch this food, however, there was one thing he had to know.

“How is he?”

Mrs Lupin sank gracefully to the flagstones and tucked her knees up against her chest. “Eat,” she said again. 

“First, tell me how he is. Is he all right?”

She wrapped her arms around her legs. “He said I was not to tell you anything until you’d eaten.” 

Sirius was silent.

She saw the look he gave her, and her expression, which had been quite impassive, softened slightly. “He’s going to be all right,” she told him. “His father is taking care of him. It was not so bad this time. Considering…” She broke off. “ _Eat_ ,” she said sharply. “I’m going to tell you a few things, and you’re going to listen, and not talk until I say you can, so you might as well eat. I don’t want you to pass out while I’m talking.” She glared, and pursed her lips very tightly, and would not open them again until he’d taken a piece of toast, slathered it with jam, and begun to nibble at it obediently. “Where do I begin?” she said, then, almost to herself. “Could I have a cigarette, please?”

He almost choked on his toast.

She smiled faintly. “My husband and my son don’t smoke. Sometimes, I need to. Do you have any?”

Wordlessly, he put down his toast, dug into his pocket, withdrew his mashed pack of cigarettes, and passed them to her. She took one and put it between her lips, which, he could not help noticing again, were thin and well-shaped--just like her son’s. Remus had her long, graceful hands, too, and her rich, brown eyes. And her ears. Everything else, Sirius thought, he’d gotten from his father: the slender height, the light brown hair, the longish, sloping nose, and the firm, pointed chin. As for his personality, it was difficult to say. Sirius did not know the Lupins all that well. Remus’ passion for learning and his calm reserve, Sirius supposed, came from his father, while his mother had, perhaps, given him his penchant for mischief. The wry good humour Sirius had not yet seen in either parent. He chose to believe that that belonged to Remus alone.

Sylvie Lupin was watching him, he realised, so he bent industriously back to his breakfast. At length, she said, “Remus was bitten when he was five. Whose fault it was--” She paused, and sucked determinedly at her cigarette. “It was no one’s fault,” she said, finally. “I blamed myself, Nick blamed himself, and Remus blames-- But, really, it was no one’s fault. We used to have a cottage in Wester Ross. Remus liked to go outside. At night. We thought it was safe. There was a fence around the yard, he knew not to wander off. We just weren’t thinking-- The night of the full moon-- It was cloudy. We didn’t realise. And anyway, werewolves are supposed to contain themselves. In facilities provided by the Ministry. Or approved by them. It’s the _law_. But this one--” She smothered her cigarette against the flagstones, and drew another. There were tears in her eyes. Sirius saw them and wanted to say something, but she had forbidden him to speak. And anyway, what could he possibly say? He hated this other werewolf--passionately--and yet he could not help but remember the way Remus had used to plead with him--and James and Peter--not to let him out of the Shrieking Shack under any circumstances, even if they came to him in their animal forms. For the first time, he felt a stab of guilt. They’d cajoled, and finally he’d given in and he did not seem to regret his choice, but now Sirius found himself wondering.

“There was so much blood,” Mrs Lupin said softly, snapping his attention back to her. She was hugging her legs tightly, now, and her gaze was on the fishpond. “We thought he was going to die. The Healers we brought him to said it might be better if he did, but… I thought about it. I actually did think about it. I hate that I did. I’ll never tell Nick or Remus. But…I decided I couldn’t give up. That was when he was five. Well, nearly six. A little more than ten years ago, now. We didn’t know what to do for him, at first. We went to look at the Ministry’s containment facilities, Nick and I, and we hated them. We would not leave our son there, not even for one night. So, we built the shed. The first time he transformed, we thought it would help if we were near him. Not in the shed with him, but just outside it. So he could smell us. Yes, it’s very stupid, but we thought-- We were his parents, after all. How could he not know us? No one told us how it would be. It was terrible.” She shuddered, and again Sirius wanted, desperately, to say something to her, but he felt constrained by her command. “We realised, of course, that we were not helping him. That we were actually making things worse. So, we went inside the house. That might have been the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. Nick and I… We stayed awake the whole night. We sat in the living room. We didn’t say anything to each other. It was so quiet, because of the Silencing charm. We had to cast it, the Ministry said. So, until morning, we didn’t know if Remus was alive or dead.” The tears that had been brimming for the past few minutes, spilled over, finally, and began to roll down her cheeks. She swiped at them, absently, with the back of one hand. 

Sirius stopped eating. 

Sylvie Lupin’s tears did not embarrass him this time. Instead, they struck him like bolts and, unable and unwilling to defend himself, he accepted them and the pain that came with them. 

Remus’ mother said, “He almost died. That was the second time in two months that I almost lost my son, and that time, it _was_ my fault. I’m telling you this because I want you to know, before you tell me what you were doing in my yard last night, and what you feel toward my son.”

He almost spoke, then. He opened his mouth, and a small sound that was not quite a word did emerge, but Mrs Lupin went on, quellingly, “That’s the first thing you need to know. The second is that I love Remus. I told you, before, but I didn’t really _tell_ you.” She smothered her second cigarette, and did not take a third. She said, her gaze still on the pond’s unmoving water, “I love him. I thought I understood love when I met Nick, in Avignon. He told everyone he’d come to write, but I found out he was there on business for Dumbledore. My parents and my sister are Muggles, but I went to Beauxbatons. I worked there the summer after I finished school, and I met Nick after one of his meetings with Madame Maxime. I accused him of spying. He asked me out for a drink.” Another dim smile touched her lips. “I fell in love very quickly. I knew many boys who were more handsome, but there was something about him. He was very quiet, but so passionate. He sang to me, when we went walking at night. And once, when we had supper with my parents, he wore his kilt. How could I resist?” Her smile deepened, though her tears did not stop. “We had three weeks together in Avignon. Three weeks all to ourselves. Nothing seemed to touch us. It was like we were in a different world. Outside time. Then he had to return to Britain. I had to decide, very quickly, what I wanted to do. There wasn’t any decision to be made, really.” Before Sirius’ wondering gaze, she held up her hands and pressed them together, palm against palm. “He said to me that, no matter what I decided, if we stood at the opposite poles of the earth, if one of us died, we would never be farther away from each other than this.” 

She dropped her hands, and her smile fell as well. “How could I not go with him? I was aware of the danger. Dumbledore had sent him to Madame Maxime because the Dark Lord was gaining power and he wanted her help. I knew that if I went with Nick, I might have to fight in a war.” She shrugged. “I didn’t care. I went. I thought that was love. And it was. But…then we had this child. We hadn’t wanted to have children right away. Nick had wanted to show me Scotland. I had wanted to find a job. But I got pregnant, and we had Remus. From the moment he was born…” She shook her head, sweeping the long chestnut hair about her slim shoulders. It was a youthful gesture, and Sirius realised, with a small shock, that if she had married Nicholas Lupin the summer after she’d left school, she could only be about thirty-four or thirty-five--ten years younger than his own mother. He would have guessed them to be about the same age, though he’d always thought Lavinia Black looked older than her forty-five years. 

Mrs Lupin said, softly, “It was like I was under a spell. I knew, from the first moment that he looked at me, that anything I was willing to face for Nick, I was willing to face a thousand times over for Remus. Is that normal? I don’t know. My husband is sick, now. We don’t know what’s wrong, yet, but we think it’s probably very bad. We haven’t talked about it with Remus, yet, but I think he knows…or senses. Nick is my soul.” She said it so matter-of-factly. “But…he’s been with me so long that if I lost him, I think I would live, still. I wouldn’t have my soul, but I’d…remember…how it was to have one. If I ever lost Remus-- It would destroy me, completely. That’s how I feel. That’s the second thing I want you to know.

“The third thing is that, as much as I love my son, and as young as he is, his life belongs to him, not me. I want to protect him. We both do, Nick and I. But there is only so much we can do. I don’t always understand Remus, but I think it’s all right that I don’t. He can make his own choices. I trust him. So does Nick. We will never give up on him, or abandon him.

“That’s all I wanted to say. Now, I want you to talk to me. I want you to tell me what you were doing last night, in my yard. I want you to tell me why you were there and how Remus managed not to tear himself or you to pieces. I would like to know what sort of friend you are to him. It would also help if I knew why, two nights ago, he came home and announced that you had left and that he was gay, and then went to his room and would not come back down or talk to us or eat anything for an entire day.”

She looked at him, finally. He met her gaze, and held it frankly. He hadn’t thought about what he could possibly say to her. While she’d spoken, all he’d been able to do was listen, and try to process her words. Now, he opened his mouth, thinking that the words would not come and he’d look like an idiot, but to his surprise, they did, and kept coming, with surprising ease, for a long time.

He found himself telling her about his childhood. Only a few things, just enough so she’d know he hated where he was from, and did _not_ consider her son a charity case. He told her about meeting James Potter on the Hogwarts Express and promising to himself that he’d be Sorted into any house but Slytherin, that even if he wound up in Hufflepuff he’d lead that house to victory against his family’s. He told her about being Sorted into Gryffindor and the poisonous looks his cousins and their friends had given him as he’d taken his place at the table decorated with banners of crimson and gold. He told her about meeting Remus Lupin in the dorm later that night and about taking little notice of the pale, rather quiet boy--until the fifth of September, when he’d disappeared mysteriously and returned late the next day, muttering something about visiting his sick aunt and looking as though he’d narrowly survived an assault by a mad Bludger. He told Mrs Lupin, hesitantly, about his initial suspicions about her son’s monthly absences, and his always-alarming appearance upon return. She sucked in a sharp breath at that, and he told her, tersely, about his own parents’ demand for obedience from their sons, and their fondness for certain hexes. 

He told her about how he and James and Peter had become concerned about Remus, how they’d watched him, carefully, for months, and how they’d finally figured out what was going on. Well, really, it had been Sirius and James who’d done the figuring out. Mostly, Peter had done a lot of gawping and theorising, and each new theory had been more asinine than the last. He told Mrs Lupin how they’d confronted Remus, once they’d been certain, and how, once he’d admitted they were right, they’d promised they would never stop being his friends and that they would find some way to help him.

Here, Sirius hesitated. After that promise had come nearly four years of research, planning, and experimenting, so that the three of them--Sirius, James, and Peter--could become Animagi and keep Remus company during his transformations. They had promised one another--and Remus--that they would tell no one about what they and done, and, as far as Sirius knew, they had all kept their promise, thus far. There was so much at stake. As tempting as it sometimes was to transform into a gigantic black dog and take a piss at his mother’s feet, Sirius could not forget that he could do nothing for Remus were he to be expelled from Hogwarts. 

The silence lengthened, and Mrs Lupin continued to look at him. Ducking his head, slightly, he said, fumblingly, “So, we promised. All of us. And we do. Stand by him. Help him. We’ve been doing that for years. And I think it’s gotten easier for him. I mean, you said you’d noticed he looked…healthier. So.” To his dismay, he felt a flush creeping up his cheeks. He wanted to slip into the fishpond and disappear. Instead, he said, “So, now… I realised--just recently, but I guess it’s been coming for a while--I want to be…more…to him. I think I’m gay. I mean, I’ve never been with another bloke, but when I’m with him-- I’m not saying this right. I’ve only ever been with girls, but they never really felt right. I always thought I was trying too hard. Or too little. It’s not like that, with him. I mean, we’re not--together.” He said that part very quickly. “I don’t know how he feels about me. I think maybe he’s a bit hacked off at me. I sort of lied to him, before, because I wasn’t sure how he’d take it, but then when I came back to tell him the truth, I never got a chance to--” He stopped himself. He was babbling, now. He paused a moment, to collect his thoughts. Then he drew a deep breath, and went on, honestly: “I just want to be what he needs. Whatever he needs. I fancy him. Well, it’s more than just a fancy. But, if he doesn’t want that from me…I just want to be his friend. I want to be with him. Always.”

“You can’t be with him always,” Mrs Lupin said tightly. “Once a month, you can’t be anywhere near him. But last night, you were. How?”

Back to this, then. He should have guessed there’d be no getting around it. Lifting his head, he said quietly, “There’s a way.” He did not say, _You have to promise me you won’t tell anyone._ He simply placed his hands, palms-down, on the flagstones, sighed, and willed his body to change. 

The dog was not inside him as the wolf was inside Remus, and so the dog did not rip itself out of him as the wolf ripped itself from Remus, biting and clawing, punishing the human body that held it prisoner twenty-nine days out of each month. Sirius’ transformation came easily, and he loved the feel of it. It was like sliding into a silk robe, or submerging in clear, cool water. He hadn’t realised it would be so easy, or feel so pleasant, the first time he had done it. The discovery had filled him with chagrin; it hadn’t seemed fair, and still did not, despite all he’d been able to do for Remus in dog-form. 

Looking at Mrs Lupin, now, through his canine eyes, he thought that perhaps that was the reason she was crying again. Instinct told him to go to her and lick her face clean of tears. Dim remembrance of who he really was and what he was doing constrained him. While he stood there uncertainly, Remus’ mother covered her mouth with one hand, as though to force back a sob. She reached out, slowly, with her other hand, and touched the underside of the dog’s muzzle.

He flinched at the touch. She withdrew her hand quickly. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “You-- I-- Turn back, please.”

He did. She reached toward him, again, but, blinded by her tears, she missed his face. He was glad. The last woman who’d touched him there had been his own mother, and her touch had been a slap. He took her small, seeking hand between his larger ones, and held it. “I just want to be what he needs,” he said again.

“I don’t approve,” Sylvie Lupin told him, weakly. “That doesn’t mean I don’t care for you, or love what you’ve done. I don’t want my son to be gay. I don’t want _you_ to be gay. Please don’t ever tell him I said that. It’s just too much. I know how cruel people can be. I don’t want that for either of you. I accept it, though. I accept you. Thank you.”

She did not say, _I will never tell anyone what you’ve shown me_. There was no need. She leaned forward, and he realised a few seconds too late, that she meant to kiss him. He felt her lips graze his cheek, and he was embarrassed. But then she said, in his ear, “All right. You’ve convinced me. I’ll give you a chance if my son will.”

*

Remus answered his second knock. “Come in,” he called, hoarsely, and Sirius swallowed his fear, and pushed the door open, slowly.

The small bedroom was as he’d remembered it, except for one detail: the bed he’d used had been transfigured back into a steamer trunk and shoved back against the wall, below the west-facing window. Sirius eyed the trunk longingly for a moment, then the chair by Remus’ desk, then the edge of Remus’ bed. His legs shook under him, but he didn’t think he had the strength to cross the floor to any of those three things. So, he clung to the doorknob and, very warily, shifted his gaze to the head of the bed.

Remus lay against the pillows, a thin blanket drawn up to his chest, a book at his side. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. His arms were bandaged; the blanket hid his other injuries. Even against the white linen of his bandages, and the pillowcases, his skin was pale. His cheeks were sunken, and the shadows under his eyes were so dark they looked like bruises. But he still looked better than Sirius felt. Perhaps that was the reason he was the first to speak. “So,” he said.

“So,” Sirius echoed. Then, hurriedly, “Can see why you’re called Remus. Your mum’s a bit of a she-wolf. You’re a lot braver than I am, coming out to your folks. I couldn’t do that. But then, my folks are a bit farther round the twist than yours.”

“Catriona Lynton doesn’t have a cousin one or two years older than we are,” Remus informed him weakly, but still rather matter-of-factly. “If she had, he would have gone to Hogwarts, and we’d have known about him. I realised that as I was walking back home. After putting you on the Knight Bus. He could have been a Squib, but that didn’t make sense. The Lyntons are as proud of their purity as the Blacks. A Squib would have been kept quiet.”

“Well-spotted,” said Sirius dryly. “You have us figured out, I see.”

“ _Or_ ,” Remus continued, as though there had been no interjection, “you’d have bragged about the fact that the boy you fancied was a Squib. It would have been too good an act of rebellion to pass up.”

“That does sound like me,” Sirius admitted.

“Either way…your behaviour was just a little too strange for that to be true. You said it wasn’t James, and I believed you. I didn’t think it could have been Peter. So, either it was someone you knew I’d detest, or it was me. There aren’t really any blokes I detest, but there are one or two you _think_ I should detest. You’d have been reluctant to admit it, if it had been Snape…”

“You know me so well.”

“I don’t know you at all,” Remus said, flatly. “The Sirius I know, or thought I knew, doesn’t lie to his mates.”

“No,” Sirius said, “that’s something _you_ do.”

Remus went even whiter.

“I only lied,” said Sirius, “because I thought I’d lose you if you knew the truth. I tried to tell you. You weren’t exactly understanding.”

Remus closed his eyes, and that made things a little more bearable. “I couldn’t believe it. It didn’t make any sense. I knew you were having problems with Cat. I knew you’d had problems with your other girlfriends. But you’ve always liked girls. I’ve watched you fall for one after another. I’ve never-- But, I believe you, now. I believe you care about me--a lot. I care about you, too, more than anything. But, you need to know… Once I realised you were telling the truth, I started to think about us, and I’ve reached two conclusions. Either you like me so much you’re willing to risk our friendship in order to be with me, or you care about our friendship so little you’re willing to risk it for a fling. I need to know which it is. If it’s the first one, all right. But you have to mean it. I mean, really mean it. Because I’m telling you the truth. If we start something, and it doesn’t work out, I don’t think we can go back to being friends. If it’s the second--all right. I can accept that. I won’t do anything with you, but at least I’ll know where I stand. And we’ll never be more than what we are, now.”

“What are we, now?” Sirius asked warily.

“I think we’re friends.”

“I want us to be more than friends,” Sirius said. “I care about you. More than anything. More than--”

“Don’t say more than James.”

“It’s true, though,” insisted Sirius. “Well, it’s different. I think--I think I used to be attracted to James, just a little. But it was different.”

“How?” 

“I was always competitive with James,” said Sirius, wishing he’d had time, like Remus, to memorise what he wanted to say. “I think a part of me wanted to impress him. Wanted his approval. I think that’s why I stuck with the Quidditch. I love flying. I only ever feel really free when I’m on my broomstick. Or when I’m Padfoot. But I was never really into the team stuff. I mean, you and James and Peter are the best mates a bloke can have, but--that’s different, too. Anyway, I never fancied James the way I fancy you. I mean, I want to impress you. I want you to be proud of me. But I also want-- I want to touch you,” he said, deeply embarrassed, and glad Remus had not yet reopened his eyes. “I--”

“You want to fuck me?”

The word sent a jolt through him. “Yes,” he admitted. “No. I mean--that’s not the right word.”

“Isn’t it? I want to fuck you. You’re bloody gorgeous. I want to see you starkers, spread out under me. I want to be inside you and--”

“ _Stop_. Will you bloody stop?” The words felt wrenched from him.

“So, that’s not what you want.”

“It _is_ what I want. But that’s not--I don’t want it to be like that.”

“But that _/is_ how it would be. We’re both blokes.”

“I know that,” said Sirius. “Do you think I haven’t thought about that? I’ve had a few days to think about how I feel about you and what it means. The question of sex did _not_ escape my attention. I’ve thought about you and me, and what it would be like.”

“But, if you’ve never--”

“ _Stop_.” They couldn’t go on like this. For one thing, Sirius had no more strength to expend on this argument. For another, it was clear they weren’t getting anywhere. “Just, stop. I can’t do this, anymore.”

“Why not?” Remus asked, opening his eyes at last and lifting his brows. “I’ve been doing this for a year.”

“I’ve been doing it for three.” He held tightly to the doorknob. “I don’t mean I’ve fancied you for three years. I really did realise that only a few days ago. I mean, I’ve known…suspected…” He looked away from Remus, to the window. Outside, the garden was awash with sunlight. It was past noon. His gaze on the apple tree’s yellow-green leaves, Sirius licked his lips and said, “I’ll tell you one more secret, if you like. For your collection. It’s the last one, though. You know all the rest.” When Remus said nothing, he continued. “You know my first time was when I was thirteen. It wasn’t with a bloke, but it was--because of one, I guess.” Merlin, he was tired. He supposed his legs were still trembling, but he couldn’t feel them, anymore. He couldn’t feel any part of his body. That was good. He could tell this if he could absent himself from his body, convince himself that someone else was giving this story to Remus, or that it was someone else’s story altogether. 

Whoever still had control of his mouth made it say, “I was thirteen. This was over Easter holidays, our second year. My parents wanted me home, remember? Wanted me present for this social family gathering thing. A lot of relatives were there. Friends of the family. Lots of people I’d never seen before. There was this bloke.” The sunlight was blinding, the sky a piercing blue. “He was older than me. A lot older. He was gorgeous. He had this long, silvery blond hair, and these grey eyes. He was one of the Malfoy cousins. _Not_ Lucius. Probably a complete git, but I spent most of the time watching him. I wanted him. I’d never been with a girl, then. Never gave them much thought, really. I just saw him, and thought--that’s what I want. Bellatrix saw me watching him.” Even the stranger who had taken control of his body hesitated, here. From wherever he’d gone, Sirius wondered what Remus was doing as he heard this. He couldn’t make himself--his body--turn and look. Presently, he heard himself continue. 

He heard himself tell Remus how, after his parents’ guests had begun to leave, he’d gone up to his bedroom, changed, crawled under the covers, and started to wank off, thinking of the gorgeous bloke he’d seen. How, before he’d finished, he’d heard the door open and, thinking it was Kreacher, had stilled his hand and pretended to be asleep. How it hadn’t been Kreacher at all, but Bellatrix. How she’d gone to his bed and ripped back the duvet, exposing him. How she’d taunted him. The words she’d called him. What he’d called her in return. How somehow she’d wound up in the bed, beneath him at first, then somehow, on top of him. How, in his anger and shame, he’d tried to hurt her, and how she’d mocked him, in response, and laughed at his efforts. _If this is the best you can do, perhaps you_ should _be some man’s plaything. You’ll never please a woman._ How she’d left him, finally, feeling used and revolted.

“That would put me off women, too.”

Sirius started.

He was back in his own body, and Remus was standing before him, obviously exhausted, obviously in pain, but holding himself up somehow, and holding out a hand. Sirius felt the fingertips graze his cheek. He tensed--and knew he really could not go on any longer. He’d passed the limits of his strength long ago. “Is it enough?” It was almost a plea. “I don’t have any more secrets to give you. You know how I feel. Is it enough? If it’s not enough, then I don’t--”

Remus did not let him finish. He touched his fingertips to Sirius’ lips, silencing him. “It’s enough,” he said softly. Then he wound one arm around Sirius’ waist, and drew him away from the door.

Bereft of the doorknob’s support, Sirius nearly stumbled, but Remus did not let him fall. He caught him and held him up. How they made it to the bed, Sirius never knew. Suddenly they were there, and Remus was helping him to sit. Then he was gathering up his legs and easing him back against the covers. Remus removed his boots. He heard the thuds as they hit the floor. Then Remus was climbing into bed beside him. Sirius flailed blindly with one hand. Remus caught it, and held it. 

“I’m here,” he whispered. “I’m right here.”

Sirius remembered the words he’d tried to say in the shed that morning-- _I’m here. It’s going to be all right. I’ll take care of you_ \--and the words Sylvie Lupin had quoted to him, a short while ago, in the garden -- _I will never be farther away from you than this._

Here was shore, and it wasn’t bleak. Here was Remus, curling toward him, still clutching his hand, murmuring, “I won’t leave you. Go to sleep, Padfoot.”

A second later, he did.

*

When Sirius awoke, much later, he was aware of three things: it was dark, his legs ached abominably, and Remus was still beside him--with his pyjama shirt on--stroking his hair.

“Hello,” said Remus, softly.

Sirius tried to say “Hello” back, and he intended to follow that up with “It’s me, not James, right?”, but when he opened his mouth, all that came out was a groan of pain.

“What’s the matter?” Remus asked at once, concernedly.

“M’ _legs_ ,” he managed to croak. Merlin, what the _fuck_ had he done to himself? Then he remembered. “ _Fuck_.”

“What’s wrong with your legs?”

“They fucking _hurt_. No, don’t stop--” But Remus was already sitting up and reaching for the lamp that stood on the bedside table. Sirius blinked in the sudden bright light.

“What’s wrong with your legs?” Remus asked again.

“I told you, they hurt. It’s a long way from Edinburgh to Melrose.”

Remus stared down at him, uncomprehending. “What were you doing in Edinburgh? _When_ were you in Edinburgh?”

“Last night,” Sirius grunted. “I got off the Knight Bus, there.”

“Wasn’t it going to stop in Melrose?”

“Yeah,” said Sirius, somewhat reluctantly. “But there were three more stops. The moon was almost up. I was getting impatient. I’m an idiot,” he concluded, finally.

Remus did not contradict him. “Do you know how far it is from Edinburgh to Melrose?”

“I do, now.”

Remus made a sound that was more a sigh than a laugh. He bent over Sirius, gathered his legs once more in his arms, and drew them up so that they lay draped across his waist.

“Isn’t this hurting you?” Sirius asked, then winced as Remus wrapped both hands around one of his calves, and squeezed, slowly.

“I’m mostly healed,” Remus said. He slid his hands a little lower, and squeezed again, eliciting another pain-laced hiss. “It’s been a few hours. More than a few, actually. It’s nearly midnight. You slept about twelve hours. Mum and Dad came by a few hours ago. With supper. Are you hungry? There’s still some…” Sirius shook his head. “Actually,” Remus went on, “I think they wanted to make sure we weren’t dead, or… You didn’t so much as twitch. Anyway…” He continued to massage Sirius’ legs, but he ducked his head, so his fringe spilled over his eyes. “I’m sorry I was cruel to you, before.”

“You weren’t cruel.”

“I was. After what you did for me-- What you said. I could see you were exhausted, but… You shouldn’t have had to tell me that, if you didn’t want to. Your secrets belong to you.”

“I belong to you.”

The hands paused. The disheveled brown head did not lift. “Padfoot…” There was a slightly desperate edge to his tone.

“ _Remus_ ,” said Sirius. “Will you look at me? _Look_.” And when Remus did lift his eyes and look at him, finally, “I’m falling in love with you,” he said. “That’s what I told your mum. Well--I told her I wanted to be whatever you needed me to be. I think she understood. Do _you_? I’m falling in love with you, you bloody idiot, and--I want to. I’m glad it’s you. So glad.” While he spoke, Remus resumed stroking. It hurt, but under the ministrations of those strong, slender fingers, the knotted muscles were beginning to loosen. “I want to be in love with you. Your mum thinks it’ll be really hard for us. She’s probably right. I don’t care. I want to be in love with you. I want to do things for you. Make things for you. I want us to be more in love than your mum and dad.”

“My mum and dad have a perfect marriage,” Remus said, sounding wistful. “They really love each other. They’re in a lot of pain right now, but they think it’s worth it. I can’t always make up my mind, if that much love is worth that much pain, or if it isn’t. Part of me wants to tell you you’re completely mental. You don’t know what you’re talking about. Not that I don’t believe you, but you really don’t _know_. You may be gay, but you’ve been with girls. I haven’t. Ever. I’ve only ever been with blokes. No one you’d know,” he said quickly, when Sirius frowned at him questioningly. “For a while…I guess you could say Geoff Abbott and I were boyfriends. He’s a Hufflepuff. Our year. We never came out to anyone, though. We made out a few times, but mostly we had study dates. Not very romantic. We sort of broke up in June. He wanted to come here for the summer, and I didn’t want him to see the shed, and maybe guess… Anyway.” The smile he flashed Sirius then was small and somewhat sheepish. “My unimpressive love life. Still, I know more about being gay than you. I _know_ I fancy blokes. And I know you do, too, but… You’ve never been with one. What happened with your cousin wasn’t normal. That was--”

“Incest?”

“I was going to call it something else. But I can see it putting you off women, or thinking you had to prove yourself to them, and that’s why… No, I _believe_ you,” he said, when Sirius would have protested. “Listen. There’s no way this is going to sound right. Part of me wants to tell you to go out and shag--or at least snog--as many blokes as you can until you’re _sure_. Only a very small part of me, though.”

“Good,” said Sirius. “Because if you wanted me to, I’d think about it. But you know I wouldn’t do it. I want you.”

“And I want you. That’s why I know I’m not going to suggest it, really. I’d be too jealous. I was never really jealous of your girlfriends--except Maddin, maybe--because I could see you weren’t really happy with them. I hate the idea of you with other blokes. I hate it almost as much as I think I hate your cousin, now. To be honest with you--to be perfectly honest, since you deserve that--I think I’m falling in love with you, too. I just can’t decide if I want that or not. Because, like I said, on the one hand, it means so much to me that we’re friends. On the other…on the other hand…I think I’m willing to risk losing your friendship, on the chance I might really find-- _you_. And that scares me, too. Because I don’t have _so_ many friends that I can really risk losing one. On the _other_ hand--”

“You only have two hands,” Sirius cut in. “And both of them are on _me_.” _So, unless you have some other freakish quality you need to confess, in order to one-up me, again…_ he nearly quipped, but the way Remus looked just then stopped him in time. Remus was smiling. The lamplight threw colour onto his cheeks and filled his eyes with amber sparks. Sirius realised three things, then, in quick succession. The first was that Remus’ hands were not merely on him; they were on his thigh. The last time he’d given them any thought they’d been moving downward, from calf to ankle. At some point they’d switched direction, and somehow he’d missed it. The second thing he realised was that it was still only the beginning of August. The last three weeks of summer still stretched before them like a sunlit path. Three weeks together, without anything to do but find each other, and learn each other. The third thing he realised was that he did not care. 

Before he could think about it any more, and maybe change his mind, he said, decisively, “Kiss me.”

Remus blinked at him. “Were you even listening?”

“I was,” said Sirius. “We were talking about decisions. And hands. I’ve decided I want to kiss yours.” 

Remus hesitated. Sirius did not. He caught one slender hand and brought it to his lips. He kissed the callused fingertips, lightly. Then, as Remus inhaled sharply, he kissed the palm. First he grazed the soft flesh with his lips. Then he touched it with the tip of his tongue. Remus shivered, but did not pull away. Emboldened, Sirius lapped at Remus’ palm, teaching himself the shape of it, revelling in the salty taste. He caressed each finger, bit down teasingly on the thumb. 

Remus made a sound in his throat that was very close to a sob. But then he was curling over Sirius--flowing over him, it seemed, like water. Sirius had to drop the hand he’d been playing with, because now there was not enough room for it, between their faces. He touched his tongue to the tip of Remus’ nose, and Remus laughed against him, his hands on Sirius’ sides, then under his shirt, so cool and so good against his burning skin. 

Someone’s heart was beating very rapidly, and someone was hard as hell. It was both of them, Sirius realised in a moment, as he bent his legs to wrap them around Remus’ waist. Their groins nudged together. They both gasped at the pleasure that laced through them, at that touch. So _this_ was how it was, being with a bloke. Everything his body did, his partner’s body mirrored. There could be no secrets between them. Not in bed, anyway. When Sirius told this thought to Remus, he laughed again, and continued to drop clumsy, inflaming kisses up and down the side of his neck.

“So, I can always tell,” Sirius said, “when you want it from me.”

At that, Remus lifted his head and studied him bemusedly. “Always?” he said, cupping Sirius’ cheek and tracing the bones of his face with the pad of his thumb. “I’ve wanted this from you for a year. You weren’t very observant.”

True. “I’ll have to keep you close, then.” _No farther apart than this…_ He lifted his head and kissed Remus, firmly, on the mouth.

He’d been half-afraid it would be like kissing Cat, or any one of his other girlfriends. Lips were lips. He hadn’t counted on Remus’ scent sweeping over him, or the taste of his breath, or the way his hands moved over his face, or the weight and shape of his body. Any one of those things would have overcome his doubts and any lingering hesitation. Combined, they ravished him, so thoroughly that when Remus broke the kiss, finally, Sirius fell back against the bed, gasping, every inch of him stinging with desire, and wild for more.

“I’ve made my decision,” Remus said. “Kiss me again.”

02/29/04


End file.
